Broken Memories
by Kiyo Kage
Summary: Revamp of previous story.  I'll be taking down future stories as I rewrite them.  Rika and Cloe have just found out they're witches, but are the horrors of a past they can't remember truly over?
1. Chapter 1

Summary: Rika and Cloe are two pre-teen girls attending Hogwarts for the first time. What happens when their repressed memories come back to haunt them? Are the horrors of their pasts truly over?

Warnings: Does not follow the Harry Potter storyline at all. Has the characters, that's it. Cloe and the Golden Trio are in their third year (Cloe's age was estimated at about 13, she's actually 16) and Rika was put in first year (She's actually 11). Storyline will eventually leave Harry Potter and become Wolf's Rain. This is the first of four stories.

Author's Note: I was rereading this story and decided to take it down and completely revamp the story. Blade-Guardian is writing with the same characters, same basic storyline, just through a different point of view and a different time. It will start out as a Wolf's Rain fanfic instead of this, which is pretty much meant to give some background for Rika and Cloe.

Disclaimer: Don't own Harry Potter, those characters, or Hogwarts. I don't own Cloe. I do own Rika, however, and share ownership of the storyline with Blade-Guardian.

Two young girls stood, facing the pillar that was apparently the gate to "Hogwarts", a school for wizards. Three days ago, neither of them believed in magic. Hell, one week ago they didn't even know their own names.

One of them was only five feet tall, with black and brown hair. Her eyes were a light gray, and she was wearing an old, torn pair of jeans with a black hooded sweatshirt. She was obviously younger than the other girl, and remained silent through the questioning. She was covered in scars, but neither she nor the older girl could answer where they had come from.

The taller girl was around six feet tall, and had black hair with a silver streak that reached her hips. Her eyes were a deep golden color, and she had an air of authority around her. Dressed in the same type of clothes as her shorter counterpart, she answered the questions to the best of her ability, but there was only so many times one could say "I don't remember" before the interrogation got annoying.

The two of them had shown up at the front doors of "Our Savior's Home" with nothing but a backpack each. Neither girl could say how they got there, their names, or how old they were. After a day, the nuns had renamed the smaller girl "Rika" and the taller one "Cloe". Based on their looks, the nuns guessed Rika to be eleven and Cloe to be thirteen. Just two days after they arrived, owls had come to the orphanage, delivering their Hogwarts letters.

If the first three days were hectic, the next three were a whirlwind. A wizard by the name of Lupin took them from the orphanage, bringing them to Diagon Alley. Their lives became like a fantasy story, changing with one letter. All of a sudden, the school was giving them funding to get robes, a wand, and some muggle clothes. They came to accept their new names, figuring it was easier than trying to remember their old ones. Also, the letters had been addressed to Rika and Cloe, so it seemed they were going to be called by these names for at least the next few names.

But thinking about the past didn't help them now. Lupin had disappeared, telling them to get to Platform 9 and ¾. He had told them about the pillar, but not how to get through it and onto the train that would take them to their new home.

"Maybe he's just messing with us," Rika groaned, leaning against the railing. "It's a brick pillar, how the hell are we supposed to get through it?"

"Is there anyone else around here who looks like they might be a wizard?" Cloe pondered aloud, looking around. Unfortunately, wizards weren't very well known in the muggle world, so those who might be able to help blended in with those attempting to board the normal trains.

"So we just hang around here until somebody helps? The train leaves in half an hour," Rika mumbled, kicking a stray pebble.

"Well it's either that or make fools of ourselves by attempting to get through the brick. Take your pick," Cloe joined Rika against the railing, glaring at the pillar. More and more, it was looking like Lupin had been playing them. There was no way to change the laws of physics to allow them to pass through a brick wall.

"Fred, George, behave yourselves!" came the yell of a woman. Interested, the two young witches turned to face the noise. A woman came to a stop in front of the pillar, five redheaded teenagers surrounding her. When they turned to face the two girls, discomfort was apparent on their faces as they tried to come up with a reason to get the two "muggles" to leave so they could enter the platform.

"We need help. We were told Platform 9 ¾ was here, but I think someone was playing a prank on us. Is there any way to get there?" Cloe questioned, stepping forward.

"Are you serious?" one of the twins piped up. Rika nodded, scowling as the group of redheads started laughing.

"Just follow us," the other twin chuckled, pushing his trunk through the brick pillar. As each witch/wizard went through, Rika and Cloe's eyes got wider.

"I guess that answers the question," Rika stated, grabbing her trunk. "But that Lupin guy couldn't let us know that we needed to walk into the wall?"

"It'd make too much sense, Rika," Cloe reasoned, following the shorter girl through the wall.

On the other side, it seemed like a different world. There were men and women of all ages in robes, waving goodbye to their children as they boarded the train. Rika looked around, trying to understand what was going on with everybody.

"We have to get on the train before it leaves," Cloe whispered, nudging the younger girl toward the train. Rika nodded, starting to walk toward the loading area.

Finding a place to sit turned out to be an adventure on its own. Finally, they made it to a compartment that only had four people in it-two of the redheads from earlier, a boy with black hair, and a girl with frizzy brown hair.

"Can we sit here?" Cloe asked as Rika stepped in, placing her trunk on the floor next to an empty seat. Cloe shrugged, sitting down next to the young witch. "Well, I guess we should introduce ourselves. I'm Cloe and she's Rika."

"Nice to meet you. I'm Hermione Granger, those two are Ron and Ginny Weasley, and he's Harry Potter," Hermione paused for dramatic effect, shocked when neither witch gave any indication they'd heard of the famous wizard. Seeing the look on the bushy-haired girl's face, Rika deadpanned.

"Are we supposed to know who he is?" Rika asked, leaning against the window.

"He's the savior of the wizarding world! He defeated You-Know-Who when he was a baby! Every witch or wizard knows who he is," Hermione explained as Harry looked more and more uncomfortable.

"He was a baby. How do I know it wasn't dumb luck?" Rika countered, causing Cloe to place a hand on the younger girl's shoulder.

"Rika, play nice. And why don't we change the subject? What year are you guys?" Cloe asked, trying to keep the peace.

"Third, except for Ginny, she's a second year," Ron answered, getting up as the snack trolley passed by.

"What about you two?" Harry asked, thankful that the conversation had been turned away from him.

"This is my first year, but since I'm thirteen, they want to try me in third-year classes. She's a first year," Cloe answered, grimacing at the snacks on the trolley. "What the hell are those?"

Author's Note: Read and Review! There will be more of a plot later on, right now I'm just trying to get them to Hogwarts. Flames will be used for the bonfire I've been planning with my friends.


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter. All I have is Rika and co-ownership of the storyline. Cloe belongs to Blade-Guardian. Don't sue.

Author's Note: No, I didn't not mess up when I categorized this under angst. The angst is coming. I just needed to set the stage for the story.

…

Two hours later, they had finally arrived at Hogwarts. Rika had fallen asleep halfway into the conversation, but Cloe found herself enjoying talking to Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Ginny. She found out that they belonged to Gryffindor, which was known as the noblest house in Hogwarts. Apparently Slytherin was the house to watch out for, as every evil wizard had come from that house. Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff weren't as extreme as the two of those houses, but Gryffindor was still the best.

She also learned that you don't get to choose your house. The first meal begun with a sorting, where a hat would determine your fate. That part made her nervous, how could an article of clothing be able to place her where she wanted to be?

She shook her head as she woke Rika up, pushing the half-awake girl out of the compartment. She was shocked at the animals pulling the carriages that the other students were loading into, they seemed like horrible disfigured horses. What was more confusing was that most of the students didn't even seem to be able to see the beasts.

Rika jumped back at the sight, before sighing in relief when she saw the boats that first years (and Cloe) were able to ride instead. As they approached the castle, her jaw dropped. It was beyond huge! As they stepped into the Great Hall, the first thing she noticed was the four long tables.

"Why are there only four tables?" Rika whispered, grabbing Cloe's sleeve.

"Four houses. We're going to be sorted into one of them. I'll explain later," Cloe answered, hoping the two of them would end up in the same house. For some reason, she had a compulsion to take care of the younger witch, not to mention Rika was likely to set something on fire if Cloe wasn't there to stop her.

"Johnson, Cloe," The professor called, holding up a worn hat. The two of them had chosen to go with a generic last name, so the nuns could at least write up some form of identity card for them.

Cloe sat awkwardly, waiting for the hat to make up its mind. It almost comforted her to know it couldn't see further than a week behind in her mind-it saved her from learning something about her past in front of the entire castle. "GRYFFINDOR!" the hat shouted. Cloe stepped down, moving to sit at the Gryffindor table.

"Johnson, Rika," was the next name called. Rika went through the same treatment-the hat trying to look into her past, only to fail. After a minute of silence, another shout of "GRYFFINDOR" was heard, and she took her seat next to Cloe.

"A hat?" she asked, confusion evident on her face.

"If you would have stayed awake for the ride, you would have known," Cloe smirked, Rika seemed to be a lot jumpier and confused that she was back at the orphanage.

As the sorting continued, Cloe started talking with the trio again, trying to figure out more about Hogwarts. "So where are the dorms? This is only one building, so I'm assuming there somewhere in here."

"We're in the seventh floor tower," Ron piped up, grinning as their food finally appeared in front of them. He lost all interest in the conversation as he began shoveling as much food as he could onto his plate.

"Let me guess, we get to walk up the stairs to get there?" Rika asked, realizing exactly how long of a walk she was going to take every morning just to get to breakfast.

"Apparently there are some portraits that hide passageways, but we haven't found them," Harry answered, taking a drink of his own juice. All of a sudden, the Great Hall fell silent. Cloe and Rika turned to the front, where a man they assumed to be Professor Dumbledore stood up.

"Welcome!" At the cheery beginning, both Rika and Cloe groaned. Even the calmer, older girl couldn't stand extremely bubbly people.

"Welcome to another year at Hogwarts! I have a few things to say to you all, and as one of them is very serious, I think it best to get it out of the way before you become befuddled by our excellent feast. As you will all be aware after their search of the Hogwarts Express, our school is presently playing host to some of the dementors of Azkaban, who are here on Ministry of Magic business." Rika started to write on her arm, making sure to ask questions after the speech. She didn't know what dementors were, but she had heard of Azkaban, and that alone was enough to make her worry.

"They are stationed at every entrance to the grounds, and while they are with us, I must make it plain that nobody is to leave school without permission. Dementors are not to be fooled by tricks or disguises - or even Invisibility Cloaks. It is not in the nature of a dementor to understand pleading or excuses. I therefore warn each and every one of you to give them no reason to harm you. I look to the prefects, and our new Head Boy and Girl, to make sure that no student runs afoul of the dementors." Cloe grimaced at that, and pulled on Rika's shoulder.

"You don't get into any trouble or I'll kill you myself, you got that?" she threatened. The last thing she needed to worry about was her hot headed friend getting on the wrong side of these dementors.

"Yes mother," Rika teased, rolling her eyes as Dumbledore continued.

"On a happier note, I am pleased to welcome two new teachers to our ranks this year. First, Professor Lupin, who has kindly consented to fill the post of Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher." There was a piece of good news. Lupin was a pretty good guy, and was very down to earth from what they had seen.

Looking over at Ron, Hermione, and Harry, they seemed to know the professor as well. "He was the one who took care of the dementors on our way here from the train," Hermione explained. "You guys didn't see it because you took the boats here."

"As to our second new appointment, well, I am sorry to tell you that Professor Kettleburn, our Care of Magical Creatures teacher, retired at the end of last year in order to enjoy more time with his remaining limbs. However, I am delighted to say that his place will be filled by none other than Rubeus Hagrid, who has agreed to take on this teaching job in addition to his gamekeeping duties. Well, I think that is everything of importance. Let the feast begin!"

"The feast has already begun, old man," Rika snickered. "I don't think that Ron heard a word of what was said. Now, what are…dementors?" she tried reading the chicken scratch on her arm.

"Dementors are the guards of Azkaban. Muggles can't see them, but they suck any positive emotion out of a human being. The Dementor's Kiss is the worst fate a human can face-the dementor sucks out your soul," Hermione explained in one breath.

"And they're allowed to be at this school?" Cloe questioned, taking a bite of her food.

"Dumbledore's not happy about it," Harry observed, looking at the headmaster.

The rest of the feast was fairly uneventful, and eventually the Gryffindors found themselves starting the trek up to the tower. Apparently, Rika and Cloe were sharing their dorm with Hermione Granger and two other girls they had yet to meet.

Author's note: For the purposes of my story, the dementor scene changed. As did the way they met Prof. Lupin. Read and Review!


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue

Note: In the first chapter, I said it doesn't follow the HP storyline. I lied. This takes place during the third book with a few changes.

… … …

The first day of classes proved to be an obstacle for Rika. Yes, Cloe was in a new school as well, but because of her age, she was able to follow Harry, Ron, and Hermione, all of whom already knew where they were going. Rika was two years behind them, and her schedule didn't follow theirs at all. In fact, the only time the two of them met up was during lunch.

The third years started the day with Herbology with the Hufflepuffs. Cloe ended up being paired with Neville, who was surprisingly good at anything that had to do with plants. They were working with mandrakes once more, ensuring that the school would have a stash in case a repeat of last year was to occur.

Following Herbology was Potions, which they had with the Slytherins. Cloe couldn't decide whether she hated the class because Harry, Ron, and Hermione started complaining right way, or because she didn't like the class itself. Snape had an obvious preference for the Slytherins in the class and seemed to take pleasure in harassing the Gryffindors.

Next was Defense Against the Dark Arts, which quickly turned out to be Cloe's favorite class. Lupin was an amazing teacher, and within a few minutes had the entire class engaged in a battle against the boggart that he had brought with him. Cloe stepped up to the case and the boggart turned into a black wolf. Looking closer, the wolf had cuts and scars from her ears to her tail. Any friendliness was gone from the animal's eyes as it turned a glare onto the rest of the class.

Cloe didn't know what to do. She never thought she was afraid of wolves, and it wasn't the actual form of a wolf that scared her. This wolf was familiar, but she couldn't figure out how. Shaking, she raised her wand, but she couldn't force the words out of her mouth. Eventually, Lupin stepped forward, changing the wolf into a harmless poodle before locking up the boggart.

For Rika, Potions was the first class of the day. She had it with the Ravenclaw first years, and she liked having Snape as a Professor. He didn't take any shit, and was straight forward about how he wanted work done. As the hour ended, she was able to successfully brew a beginners potion, which was a feat of extraordinary measures for her attention span.

Transfiguration and Herbology seemed to take forever, so when Charms came along, she spent the class messing with the feather they were supposed to be levitating. After two failed attempts, she ended up blowing up the feather (how, she had no idea. Something that small shouldn't be able to make that big of an explosion) and was given extra homework. She bit back the remark that, if she didn't like the class now, what made the short man think she was going to care about it later?

Finally they had gotten here, to the Great Hall for dinner. Rika took her seat next to Cloe before putting some mashed potatoes on her plate. Cloe took some of the chicken, needing more nutrition than the smaller girl.

"Why are you scared of wolves?" Harry asked Cloe as Ron shoveled as much as he could into his mouth.

"I'm not. I don't know why that showed up. Why didn't he let you face the boggart?" Cloe countered.

"Isn't it obvious? Professor Lupin was worried that You-Know-Who would show up and cause panic," Hermione reasoned.

"But I wasn't even thinking about him. I was thinking about those dementors," Harry told her. "Although, I don't even think you went."

"No, we ran out of time when Ron took too long to take care of that spider," Hermione snipped, taking a sip of her juice.

"I told you guys, I hate spiders," Ron defended himself, spewing out food as he did so.

"Swallow before speaking," Rika muttered, using her napkin to clean the bits of food that had fallen on the table.

"What's the plan for tonight?" Cloe asked, looking at the group.

"Hermione's going to do her Potions essay, and we're going to copy it," Ron answered, earning a glare from the bushy-haired girl.

"You copy from her? No wonder Snape hates you," Rika stated, finishing off her food.

"What about you?" Cloe nudged the younger girl.

"I got extra homework from Charms that I might do."

"There's no might. You're doing it," Cloe ordered, setting down her fork as she finished her own meal.

"Slave-driver," Rika groaned, standing up. "I'll meet you back in the dorm."

She climbed the stairs to the Gryffindor tower and collapsed into her bed. If she was going to be forced to study later, she might as well get a nap in.

_~Rika's Dream~_

_I was trapped. The bars had been reinforced on all of our cages when Sollecks managed to get out a while back. I tried to push against them, but the cut on my shoulder screamed in pain. It was a futile attempt anyway-I'd been in this place since I could remember._

_Peering in through the bars, I saw Arrow, my best friend. He had just come back from being with my father, and was in worse shape than I was. I needed to protect him. I'm the only one who knows what he goes through, what Acuna does to him. Arrow couldn't tell the others-he wasn't close to Hige, he was scared of Sollecks, and he didn't want to burden Blade with any more._

_I wish they'd put us back in the cage that we used to be in. The five of us were able to stick together, able to give each other some comfort. But that's why they split us up. They didn't want us to band together and revolt._

_All of a sudden, I was pulled out of my cage by a male who was almost identical to me. My twin, who would be identical to me if it weren't for the part of my DNA that gave me my gender. At only nine, he was one of the most sadistic people I knew, and I was his favorite toy._

_He was angry, I realized. Angry I hadn't fulfilled my job by killing the humans that had stumbled into our territory. I couldn't bring myself to do it-after stabbing the adults, I noticed the boy who was younger than me. Staying in my human form, I grabbed him by the wrist and dragged him away, leaving him on the doorstep of the first house I came to._

"_I thought we gave you direct orders," he snarled, slamming my already injured body against the wall. _

"_I killed those who made the decision to enter. I saw no need to kill the boy. He was no threat to us," I stated, voice already giving out on me. My throat had been weak for a while now, after the latest round of experimental injections. _

"_You don't make that decision. Father does," he paused, knocking the wind out of me as he buried his fist in my stomach. "You're lucky you'd be useless with a broken bone. But I can still have fun." He smirked, grabbing a knife from the wall. A scream ripped through my throat as he sliced into my side. "That looks like it's going to need stitches." _

_I started shaking. Stitches were hell around here. Old, rusted needles and no anesthetics. _

_~End Dream~_

Rika jolted awake, glancing around to make sure that she was still in her dormitory instead of wherever that dream had taken place.

.. … …

Author's note: Read and Review!


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer: Do I really need to say it again? Don't own, don't sue.

… … …

Cloe waited for the golden trio to finish their meal before making the trek up to the tower. "I'll meet you guys in the common room in a few minutes. I'm going to go get Rika," she muttered before heading to their dorm. When she reached the room, she saw Rika on a bed, struggling to breathe. Her eyes were wide open, and it was obvious that she had worked herself into a panic attack.

"Hey-breathe," Cloe instructed, rubbing the younger girl's back. Rika let out the breath she was holding. "You have to breathe in, too." After a couple minutes, Rika was able to get herself under control. "Now what was that about."

"Stupid nightmare. I can't even remember what it was about now," Rika muttered, pulling away to dig through her bags.

"Really?" Cloe asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Yes. Just don't bring it up to the others. The last thing I need is for them to think I'm some form of mental case." Rika finally extracted her Charms text book. "You ready to head down?"

As the two of them headed toward the common room, Cloe watched Rika. The younger girl had managed to calm down, and there was almost no physical sign that she had been freaking out just ten minutes previously. Her head was held high once more, and her face had returned to a normal color.

"Please, Hermione!" Ron begged, trying to shove his parchment into the girl's hand.

"Ronald, how are you going to learn if I do all your work for you?" Hermione groaned, buried in her Ancient Runes readings.

"When am I ever going to need to know what started the first war between goblins and wizards?" the redhead whined, turning his dejected gaze on the blank parchment in his hand.

"Hermione will you proofread my Potions essay?" Harry asked, looking down at the one foot long essay, which was the minimum length.

"Is this what you guys do every night? Have her do your work?" Rika asked, pretending to read her Charms book.

"Kinda," both Ron and Harry chorused.

"That's sad," Cloe pointed out, before looking at Rika. "Stop pretending to read and just do your assignment."

"Whatever," Rika groaned as she took to staring at her quill, willing it to write her paper on its own.

This went on for over two hours but, at the end, Hermione proofread Harry's paper as Ron finished his. Rika got her homework done (with help from Cloe), and Hermione had finished her reading. When the girls finally made it to bed, Hermione fell asleep within a minute. Looking around to make sure everyone else was asleep, Cloe walked over to Rika's bed.

"So you going to tell me what the nightmare was about?" she questioned.

"I told you, I don't remember," Rika growled. It was obvious she was lying. Her eyes seemed to close up and she refused to look Cloe in the eye.

"Really?"

"Yes, really. Get off my case." This seemed to be enough, and Cloe returned to her bed and fell into a deep sleep.

_~Cloe's Dream~_

_I felt helpless. It had been my job to look over the pups all those years ago, my job to keep them safe, and I failed. Sollecks is only six, the two pups only five, and I'm only ten. How could I allow this to happen? Hige was there with me, why they only grabbed him is beyond me._

_As always, I tried to fight back as they pulled me out of my cage. All I have left right now is my pride, and that's one thing I refuse to let them take from me. I knew it made things worse, they tended to leave us alone once we were unable to stand back up, but I couldn't give in. I had to be strong, show the pups that there's no way these people are going to break us._

_They don't know it, but Acuna started sending me out on missions long before the others. He knew I'd always come back, that I couldn't stand the idea of leaving my pack alone with that monster. I knew that, if I left, he would kill the others. They still listen to me, and they would revolt if I weren't there to keep them in line._

_All my struggling proved ineffective. Acuna cornered me in his favorite room, before turning around to glance at the display case of whips. I knew what I was being punished for. We weren't supposed to give each other our food, because that meant that we were all well fed. He would give us enough to survive, but he would have to provide more if one of us didn't eat. Arrow had looked so hungry this morning, I couldn't not give him my food. The poor pup looked like he was going to waste away._

"_We don't give you food so you can give it to the others. You all receive what you need to survive," Acuna drawled, choosing a three pronged whip._

"_He won't grow if he doesn't eat enough," I growled in return. I stiffened as the whip struck my back, but refused to cry out. I can't show weakness. _

"_He gets what he needs," Acuna repeated, striking me once more. I could feel the blood dripping down my sides, but I forced myself to bear through it. "Besides, you feeding him could cause complications with the injections." _

_I hadn't thought of that. In his attempt to make perfect warriors, he was creating and testing enhancement drugs on us. What if the food I gave him caused him to have a seizure, just like Sollecks had last week?_

_I was pulled out of my though process as a howl filled the area. I recognized it as Sollecks, and he was hurt._

"_Sollecks!" I screamed, running for the door. Acuna body-checked me into the wall and held me there as I yelled. "He's only six, you bastard! He didn't do anything!" I whimpered as the whip came down on me again, causing my legs to give out beneath me. Collapsing, I realized I didn't have hands. I had paws. And my wolf body was giving out on me._

_~End Dream~_

Cloe shot up, frantically looking around. None of the other girls appeared to be awake, so she walked to the bathroom. Staring in the mirror, she gave herself a pep talk.

"It was just a dream. You don't know where your scars are from, but there's no way they're from that guy. You're human. You're not a wolf, not even an animagus. Calm down," the talk wasn't helping. A small part of her realized that this must have been the kind of dream Rika had, but she didn't know how to approach the younger girl. If Rika didn't want to talk, she shut down.

Walking back to her bed, Cloe crawled under the covers once more, hoping for some rest.

… … …

Author's note: As always, read and review!


	5. Chapter 5

Disclaimer: Once more, don't own, don't sue. Thanks. Not that you'd be able to get anything of real worth from me anyways. I'll gladly give up my pocket lint though.

… … …

Rika was the first awake the next day, and she spent the time packing her bag for the day. Instead of waiting for the others, she headed down to the Great Hall alone for breakfast.

"I thought you lions ran in packs," came a drawl as she approached the double doors.

"I thought you snakes were supposed to be smart," Rika countered, turning around to face the infamous Draco Malfoy. "Wolves run in packs. Lions run in prides."

"Well, excuse me. I'd watch your mouth if I were you, mud blood," Draco sneered.

"Are people actually scared of you? I'm a five foot tall first year, and you need your two goons to come after me," she pointed out. Without waiting for an answer, she waltzed into the Great Hall, taking a seat at the end of the Gryffindor table. What a great start to the day.

Cloe woke up shortly after Rika left, having been able to sleep through the rest of the night. Getting ready for classes, she realized Hermione was just starting to wake up.

"Good morning," she greeted, shoving the last of her books in her bag.

"Morning," Hermione replied, starting to brush her hair.

"I'm going to get Ron and Harry. Meet you in the common room," Cloe took off, leaving Hermione to finish getting ready.

"Hey guys," she greeted, sitting down as Harry and Ron entered the common room.

"We waiting for Hermione and Rika?" Harry asked, taking a seat next to her.

"Just Hermione. Rika already went down apparently."

"Hermione takes forever," Ron whined. "I'm hungry! Why don't we head down now and she can meet us there!"

"She'd be screaming at us for hours," Harry explained, looking at the stairs.

X.X.X.

When they had finally made it to the Great Hall, Rika had already left, making her way to Hagrid's hut for her first Care of Magical Creatures class. They were going to be working with baby hippogriffs, as the older students would be working with those that had matured.

"Now, don't go insultin' the hippogriffs. They are very prideful creatures, even at the youn' age these ones are at. Today we're going to lear' about feeding them, so everybody grab on o' those dead rats and follow me," Hagrid instructed before tossing a rat into his hippogriff's mouth.

Rika stared at the hippogriff she was supposed to be feeding. The beast seemed fairly harmless, but she didn't want to test her luck by insulting it. Tossing a rat at the beast, she was the only person in class who didn't jump at the sound of the strong beak of a hippogriff breaking the bones of the animal in it's mouth.

The class was spent feeding each of the hippogriffs, throwing rats into their mouths until they refused to eat more, signaling they were full.

"So what else can they do?" Rika asked as Hagrid walked by.

"Full grow' they're excellen' flyers. Can take you prett' much anywhere," Hagrid answered, petting the youngling.

"But our class is just going to feed them?" Rika persisted, sitting down next to the animal.

"Yep. The older classes are going to take them for rides to keep them in shape," Hagrid's face lit up, as if he thought that taking care of the hippogriffs was a gift for the students of Hogwarts.

"Oh joy," Rika muttered as the half-giant joined a different group. "I hope the others are having a better time than this."

X.X.X.

It turned out that the third years weren't having much more luck. They had Divination, a class which both Hermione and Cloe believed to be lucky guesswork about the future. The two of them had given up on their teacups, not seeing whatever it was that was supposed to predict their future. On their left, however, Ron and Harry were having a blast making fun of what they were seeing.

"Why Harry, you have an egg! That means that you are going to be boiled in whatever comes your way!" Ron exclaimed, pretending to look through his book.

"And Ronald, you have the Grim! While trying to rescue me, you will be killed by a large dog who will maul you!" Cloe and Hermione exchanged glances while willing time to move faster.

"And Hermione! Your's is a book! Why, you will spend all night studying!" Ron pointed out, leaning over Hermione's shoulder.

"Wow! This thing does work! That's the same thing you do every night!" Harry added on, before looking to Cloe's.

"And your's is a cross! Either you're going to be crucified or you will encounter a religious experience!" Harry joked, nudging Cloe's side.

"Guys, calm down," Cloe groaned, dumping her teacup out. "I'm not going to be crucified and I don't believe in religion."

As Professor Trelawney walked by, the two boys bowed their heads, grieving for Ron's unfortunate future.

X.X.X.

"Are either of you going to try out for Quidditch?" Harry asked as the group joined up for lunch.

"We both are trying out to be chasers," Cloe informed Harry as she began eating.

"Good luck with that. Have either of you even rode a broom before?" Ron looked at the two transfers.

"In class. But I liked it, so I'm going to try out," Rika snapped. "I heard you're not going to?"

"Nope, I'm more than happy watching the game," Ron quipped back at her.

"Oh, so you're not good enough to play?" Rika taunted the red-haired boy, causing his face to burn up.

"I'm plenty good! I just don't want to-"

"Make a fool out of yourself?"

"Rika, play nice and eat," Cloe ordered, giving the smaller girl a light tap on the head.

After they had finished lunch, Harry, Cloe, and Rika began to trek towards the Quidditch pitch, ready for their tryouts.

… … …

Author's note: No, I won't be putting tryouts in here. I suck at writing that. Not too happy with this chapter, but it was meant to be a filler, so…


	6. Chapter 6

Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue.

… … …

"Okay, everyone, listen up!" Oliver Wood yelled out, standing on a table in the middle of the common room. "Everyone did great at tryouts. Now, here's the team. Keeper is still me. Beaters-Fred and George Weasley, Seeker-Harry Potter, and Chasers-Rika and Cloe Johnson and Katie Bell." He stepped down as the room started cheering, circling around the team members to congratulate them.

"He's not Fred, I am!" one of the twins exclaimed as a first year went to talk to them.

"No, I am!" the other twin retorted, leaving the poor first year looking like he was going to cry.

"No, I'm George!"

"No, I am!"

"Would you two stop making fools of yourself?" Percy Weasley asked, nudging the first year away.

"Great job, you guys," Hermione praised Harry, Cloe, and Rika. As they all thanked her, Cloe headed to bed, exhausted from the tryouts. Laying down, she curled up under the comforter and fell into a comfortable sleep.

_~Cloe's Dream~_

_I couldn't take any more. My body refused to get up, no matter how hard I tried. Acuna laughed, watching my display of weakness. I couldn't let him get the best of me! But I could see no other choice. I couldn't even stand, let alone fight back. He was right-I'm weak. If I were stronger, I'd be able to stop this from happening. I'd be able to protect my pack and escape._

_As he whipped me again, ordering me to stand up, I couldn't help but whimper. Couldn't he see I was trying? I wasn't laying there in an attempt to piss him off, I was laying there because I had no other option. _

_After an hour, he finally stopped the torture and lifted me off the ground. I couldn't make out what he was saying as he dragged me back to my cage, but I knew he meant for his words to hurt. When he threw me in the cage, he knelt down next to it, mocking me. All I could do was look at him. His face had lost all sense of kindness-in fact, I can't remember a time when he seemed to have a heart. _

_I leaned against the side of the cage, trying to figure out what to do next. That was all I ever did. Try to figure out how we were going to make it through the day, trying to predict what was going to come next. I had just gotten back from a mission, so that was why he was so rough with me today. He wouldn't need me for a while. He was always somewhat gentler with those of us he was planning to send out._

_I knew Hige wasn't next. He was in as bad of shape as I was, and had passed out before I was taken away. He still wouldn't open his eyes, despite Kage's periodic pleas for him to wake up. Arrow was almost never sent on missions alone, he and Kage were a team. They were both too small to take on more than a couple humans at a time, and they were both hurt, so I doubted they were going to be sent out next. _

_That left Sollecks, my little brother. He was in pain, but wasn't as bad as the rest of us. He was going to be the next one to get sent out, I knew it. They were going to make my little brother go out and kill, as they have done ever since the training had been completed one year after we were captured. He never got a chance to be a pup, we were captured so early in his life I doubted he had any memories of before._

_I started losing my ability to stay on the train of thought, and I realized Acuna must have hurt my head when I was with him. My vision began to swirl, and before I knew it, I was unconscious._

_~End Dream~_

Cloe awoke, noticing that the rest of the beds were filled. Silently, she stood up, sneaking out of the dorm. She needed time to think, so she left the Gryffindor tower and started to walk down the grand staircase, planning to walk by the lake.

Those dreams were too realistic to just be dreams, she realized. There was no way she could have two dreams that were so vivid that took place in the same setting. And that man, if she focused on his face, he shared a lot of facial features as Rika.

Did this mean that her friend was related to this guy? Was she working for him, or was she one of the pups that Cloe had seen in her dream? Kage-she realized. Rika had to be Kage. If she searched her mind, she remembered seeing the female pup in a human form, one that looked exactly like Rika. So the two of them were both captives there.

Was she a wolf? These dreams, or memories, were all from first person. There were instances where she was in a human body, but most of the time, she had a tail, paws, and the powerful body of a wolf. Was that why the boggart had turned into a wolf during class? But why would she be terrified of herself? Or was it that she was terrified of returning to that place?

Starting to walk back towards the castle, Cloe tried to keep herself calm by focusing on what she did know. Somehow, she was a wolf. She could change into that wolf. Rika was in that place with her, and Rika's father was their tormentor. Rika was always a wolf. And, inexplicably, she also knew her true name was Heaven's Blade, or Blade, for short.

"What are you doing up?" a voice asked, startling her. Turning around, Blade (no, you have to think of yourself as Cloe, she reminded herself) realized that Harry had found her.

"Needed a walk. How did you find me?"

"Fred and George gave me this map. It shows where everyone is in Hogwarts. I saw somebody walking around outside, and realized it was you. You okay?" he asked, looking at her pale face.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Let's go back." Harry nodded and led Cloe back to the dorms, stopping as they got to the portrait of the Fat Lady.

"He's here!" she was screaming.

"Who?" Harry asked, noticing the other portraits working themselves up into a panic.

"Sirius Black! He tried to enter!"

"Courage," Harry stated, making the portrait swing open and pulling Cloe inside the Griffyndor tower. Right after they entered, Professor McGonagall came running through the portrait.

"You two! Get everyone into the common room! The headmaster wants everyone in the Great Hall immediately!" She ordered, looking frantic. The two teenagers nodded, running to their respective gender's wings and alerting everyone to what was going on.

Once they had all gathered in the common room, their head of house led them to the Great Hall, with the prefects bringing up the rear. The tables in the dining area were gone, replaced by rows of sleeping bags.

"Students, this is where you will be sleeping for the night. There will be professors guarding this room around the clock while the portraits, ghosts, and other professors make sure that this school is safe," Dumbledore announced.

Harry, Ron, Hermione, Ginny, Cloe, and Rika moved a set of sleeping bags so they were in a circle, their heads together.

"How did he get in?" Hermione asked, looking like she was about to cry.

"He escaped Azkaban. This shouldn't be that hard for him," Rika pointed out. "Seriously, don't cry."

"So there's a lunatic out there who can escape the wizarding world's greatest prison and break into the safest school and he wants to kill me. That's comforting," Harry groaned, earning a sympathetic pat on the back from Ron.

… … …


	7. Chapter 7

Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue

Author's Note: As you've probably figured out, Rika and Cloe are wolves. As for aging, they age at a wolf's pace until they reach mid-teens, then they age as humans. For example, Rika is four in her dream. That's four in wolf years, meaning she is full grown. In the story, Cloe's thirteen. She is now aging at a human rate, with her wolf form having reached its peak. Just go with it.

… … …

After an hour, almost every student in the Great Hall was asleep. Rika was the last to succumb to slumber, and she fell into a dream.

_~Rika's Dream~_

_I was running, with Arrow at my side. We had been sent on a mission, and since we were both too small at the time to do damage alone, he sent us as a pair. Our mission was fairly simple-take out the wolf pack next to ours. Acuna wanted to eliminate other wolves from the world, so that only those who had become his warriors would live. _

_We had discussed the best way to take down the pack, and we agreed that setting a fire would take out most of the pack, leaving those we would have to fight injured. The back of my mind was still protesting, we were only four years old, still pups, and there was no way this went with our nature. _

_Setting the flame, I tried to block out the sound of the howls of the pack. Looking over to Arrow, he was trying to curl in on himself. This pack had done nothing wrong. But we were Acuna's warriors, and we either did what we were told or had to deal with the consequences._

_We curled up together for a minute, trying to offer each other comfort in that moment. But a minute later, a wolf came running out and recognized our collars. He was obviously the alpha, and was injured. Arrow and I launch ourselves at the wolf, going for both sides of his neck. After killing him, we looked around, trying to find other wolves who had made it out. _

_Luckily, we set the fire when the pack was asleep, and the alpha seemed to be the only wolf that had made it out alive. Before returning to the Keep, we sat outside the fire, whining. We felt so horrible for ruining the lives of that pack, but there was no other option for us. If we failed at our missions, Acuna would make our lives even worse than they already were._

_We started the journey back to the Keep, trying to block out the sounds and the stench of the burning wolves. We had to calm down before facing Acuna, otherwise we'd be punished for showing too much emotion instead of doing our job. _

_~End Dream~_

When Rika jolted awake, she woke Cloe, who was sleeping to her right. After a couple seconds where the two girls stared at each other, Cloe finally spoke.

"You okay?" she asked.

"Fine. Go back to sleep," Rika muttered, glaring at her pillow as if it had done something to offend her.

A few hours later, the rest of the students were woken up by Dumbledore's announcement that the castle was safe, and they were all free to return to their dormitories. The prefects started leading the students back to their dormitories so they could get ready for that day's classes.

"You're coming with me," Cloe ordered, pulling Rika away from the crowd. "I know what those dreams are about, Rika."

"What dreams?" Rika growled, refusing to look Cloe in the eye.

"You dream you're a wolf, don't you. And you're in a cage. And everytime you dream, it's a memory of being hurt, being punished."

"You don't know what you're talking about," Rika hissed, pulling away. "I told you, I don't remember the dreams."

"Like hell you don't. You shut off after you have them, so I know you remember them!" Cloe yelled, grabbing Rika's wrist to keep her in one spot.

"Don't you fucking grab me," Rika snarled, trying to pull her arm away. "Let me go!"

"Not until you listen. You're going to talk to me about what you see in your dream, and then we're going to figure out what they mean!" She tightened her grip, trying to keep Rika from pulling away.

"Let. Me. Go," Rika started to panic, finally pulling her wrist free. She took several steps back, glaring at Cloe. "You don't ever touch me. Stay the hell away from me!" With that, she turned and ran away from the older girl.

Cloe didn't know how she expected the chat to go, but Rika's attitude only solidified the idea that they had been abused in the past. Normal people didn't react that strongly to others using physical force to keep them put. However, now she had to try and calm the girl down once she found her.

"What's with her?" Harry asked, having turned back to find the two missing girls.

"We got into a fight. She'll be fine," Cloe answered, leaning against Harry's shoulder. "She's just got a temper."

"I can tell," Harry joked, trying to lighten the mood. "Anyway, we're going to play Exploding Snaps in the common room if you want to come. Seamus and Dean started a tournament."

"Sounds good. I'll find her later," Cloe nodded, following Harry to the common room.

Most of the Gryffindors had decided to ditch class, and the professors didn't do anything to punish them. With the threat of Sirius Black having been in the castle just last night, they decided that the students could have one day to try and recoup.

The tournament had turned out to be a blast, and when it came to the finals, Dean and Seamus were the only two left. It figured, the two who started the tournament would be the last two standing. Harry and Ron were playing wizard's chess in the corner, while Hermione and Cloe were using the free time to finish up their homework.


	8. Chapter 8

Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue. This is getting repetitive.

… … …

Rika threw another rock into the lake, trying to think about what had gone down between her and Cloe. She knew that she overreacted, but the thought of those dreams being real was too much to handle. No matter how much she tried to avoid thinking about it, though, the dreams were at the forefront of her mind.

First was the fact that, in these dreams, the people she was most scared of were her father and twin brother. She couldn't remember their names, just the fact that they looked like her, the young male obviously her almost identical twin. But why would their father treat him as a son and her as a slave? And her older brother, another name she couldn't remember. He was beaten too. He and the girl named Blade were the oldest, and Blade was their protector.

Blade protected them to the best of her ability, but it wasn't enough. She had the scars covering her body to prove it. Somewhere along the line, they became too much for the young girl to handle. Blade was there for emotional support in her dreams, but could do little to physically help them. Her younger brother, Sollecks, had become one of their strongest, channeling his rage into physical strength.

And Arrow-that name she remembered clearly. He was the one who was closest to her in age, who was beside her in all of the missions. They were both too young to go on their own, and her father didn't want to risk losing his test subjects. He had it worse than the rest of them, but she couldn't remember why. She did remember that she was the only one to know of what happened to Arrow, a fact that made her fiercely protective of the young wolf.

And that was another thing-wolves. In her dreams, they were wolves half the time and humans the rest. How did they change forms? Could she still do it now? And what was preventing her from being able to transform now? Was her father a wizard? If so, did he place a charm on her and Cloe to prevent them from being able to change?

Rika continued to come up with more questions than answers, walking along the shore. She didn't even know what her own name was, and that seemed like a crucial place to start. Maybe she should start a journal, writing down what she dreamed and what she was able to remember. That way, she could start-

"Straying away from the pack again, aren't we?" came Draco Malfoy's familiar drawl.

"Still don't know the difference between a pack and a pride, do you?" Rika countered, not slowing. She walked straight by him before he called out to her again, seeing the look on her face.

"What the hell is wrong?" he asked, dropping his typical Slytherin Ice Prince mask.

"Well, for starters, you're here," she snarled, turning around. "And you insist on bothering me."

"I'm not nice often. You should take advantage of this," Draco stated, facing her.

"Fine, you want to know? I have amnesia, I can't figure out what's real or fantasy anymore, I'm stuck with the 'Golden Trio' every time I return to the dorms, and the one person I get along with is being a bitch," Rika growled, turning to walk away again.

"Wait," Draco rushed, grabbing Rika's arm.

"Don't. Touch. Me," Rika pulled her arm away, looking at Draco with wide, almost wild eyes.

"Okay! I'm not touching you!" As if to prove it, Draco held his hands out in front of him. After a few seconds, Rika calmed down, wondering why she had such a severe reaction to people grabbing her.

"Thanks," she mumbled, looking at the ground.

"Hey, I know how irritating those Gryffindors can be. You ever need someone to talk to, or just a place to get away, send me an owl. I have a feeling you'll fit in with the rest of us snakes," Draco joked, starting to walk away.

"What the hell?" Rika asked herself, watching Malfoy leave. This wasn't the Draco she had been warned about. Even in the one time she'd met him before, he had come off as a typical pureblood wizard.

… … …

Cloe sat in the common room, wondering if it was safe to inform her new friends of what was going on. She knew that, by telling them, she would run the risk of sounding crazy. But by not telling them, that was three less people she could talk to if she needed to.

Maybe there was some form of middle ground. She remembered something they called an animagus, maybe she could ask the trio about them? Now that she thought about it, that could also be close to the truth, maybe that's what they were.

"Hey, what's an animagus? Do you have to be born one or something?" she asked, counting on Hermione to answer.

"An animagus is not something you're born as. The word comes from animal and magus, and means animal wizard. It takes a great deal of knowledge to complete a transformation, and there are only seven registered animagus at this time.

"An animagus does not get to chose their transformation. Based on your personality, you transform into an animal that matches. That animal will have an identifying mark which will link it to the human that has transformed. When transforming, a humans clothes physically disappear, and reappear when that person returns to their original self. Nobody knows what happens to the clothes," Hermione lectured, not looking up from her homework.

"How can you memorize all of that?" Ron gaped, staring at the bushy haired girl.

"I study, Ronald. It's something you could try once in a while."

"Why should I study when I can just ask you?" he retorted, grinning.

"Because you're not going to be able to ask me for help in tests," Hermione stated.

"Aw, come on Hermione! Ron always gets by on dumb luck," Harry teased, laughing when Ron threw a pillow at him. "But why do you want to know about them?"

"Weird dreams. Always with the same people, but half the time they're wolves, the rest of the time they're humans," Cloe explained, skipping over the rest of the dreams. "Maybe I knew about them before, and that's why they're like that in my dreams."

"Could be. Or maybe it's a grim," Ron joked. "You're going to die!"

"That's ridiculous, Ronald," Hermione scowled. "Everyone knows that the grim is just a myth used to scare children, like the boogeyman for muggles."

"Take a joke, Hermione," Ron scowled, rolling his eyes.

"No, I'm pretty sure they're wolves. Grims don't have the yellow eyes," Cloe explained. "So I'm not going to die anytime soon, despite what Trewlaney says."

… … …

The next day was their first quidditch math, and was against Slytherin. Rika, who had returned right before curfew, and Cloe had barely eaten, their nerves getting the best of them. Although Rika still refused to talk to Cloe, the two sat side by side in silence.

The day seemed to drag on, and by the end of the day, both girls were rattling inside their skins. Waiting to fly into the field, Harry came up to the two of them.

"Once you get in the air, you'll stop feeling like you're going to throw up," he reassured them.

"Good," Cloe sighed, her face a light tint of green. Rika nodded, her own face pale.

Three hours later, they had won purely by Harry catching the snitch as he fell, and Rika pretended to be angry with the rest of the team as they complained about calls the ref should have made on Draco Malfoy. The truth was, he hadn't done anything illegal. He may have used more force than necessary to knock Harry out of the way, but he always stayed on the legal side.

It didn't matter anyway. They had won their first game, against the Slytherins no less. The Weasley twins had managed to smuggle in some butterbeer for the team (nobody asked questions, they were used to the twins being able to get away with anything) and everyone was getting a little tipsy due to a charm that multiplied the liquid.


	9. Chapter 9

Author's Note: Warning, mentions of attempted suicide in this chapter.

Disclaimer: Don't own HP or Cloe, Sollecks, or Hige. I DO own Kage, Arrow, Fushigi. I also have shared custody of Acuna.

X.X.X.

The next morning, the Gryffindor tower was silent. Ninety percent of the students were hung over and sleeping off the events of the night before. Rika was the first up, as she was every morning, so she was able to enjoy her morning shower in silence. She stood in the shower, looking over her scars. She realized there was one in particular that worried her.

On her left wrist was a thick scar that ran a slightly jagged line from the base of her hand to halfway to her elbow. Had she really attempted suicide, as the scar suggested? Lightly tracing the source of her anxiety, she closed her eyes, willing herself to remember.

_~Flashback~_

_A young wolf, under observation after her last round of injections…_

_A mutter about negative side effects…_

_Herself, grabbing a rusted nail she found on the ground…_

_Laying in a pool of blood, listening to Arrow yell…_

_On a gurney, losing consciousness…_

_~End Flashback~_

Rika snapped out of it, leaning against the wall of the shower. She didn't understand, her dreams were all so clear, why was this so fragmented? All she could figure out was that she had been injected with something, and it appeared to enhance her suicidal tendencies.

Drying off, she pulled on her clothes and sat on her bed, writing down what she had just remembered. Making sure that others were still asleep, she tucked the journal under her mattress and left, walking down to the lake. She needed to be somewhere where she could think, alone. In the dorms, there was always the risk of somebody waking up, and Rika didn't want to talk right now.

Making it to the lake, she took off into a sprint, trying to clear her mind. She ran along the shore of the lake, only stopping once the pain in her legs and lungs became too much to handle. Dropping down, she curled up, staring past the lake.

X.X.X.

Cloe woke up an hour after Rika had left, stretching her arms over her head. Still half asleep, she dragged herself to the bathroom, taking a nice long, hot shower before dressing in her comfy clothes and climbing back into bed. However, before she fell back into a blissfully dreamless sleep, she noticed a bed was empty. It took a couple seconds, as she wasn't fully awake yet, but she realized the empty spot to be Rika's. The girl had been quiet during the party the night before, and Cloe knew it was about the fight they had a couple days before.

An inexplicable urge coursed through her, making her need to know that the younger girl was safe. She couldn't explain it-even before the dreams started, she had always felt like Rika was her responsibility. Looking out the window, she was able to see a small form curled up by the lake. Instinct told her that it was Rika, and she found herself heading outside.

On the way, she started to think about the argument the two of them had. Cloe didn't believe she had anything to apologize for, but she wanted to make sure the younger girl knew the two of them were okay.

Finally making it to Rika, she still hadn't decided what to say. The younger girl wouldn't respond to a speech.

"How are you doing?" Cloe decided to ask, sitting down next to her friend.

"Not good," Rika whispered, staring at the lake.

"You want to talk? The older girl gave Rika enough space to keep the girl from automatically shutting down, but it didn't help.

"Not really," Rika muttered. "But I didn't mean to freak out at you like that." It was the closest Rika had come to an apology.

"It's okay," Cloe comforted Rika. "But what do you remember?"

"I said I don't want to talk about it," Rika's voice was barely audible, her head leaning against her knees.

So much was going unsaid between the two wolves (they had both secretly come to terms with the fact that they were, somehow, wolves, at least in the past). Cloe was falling back into her alpha role, once more becoming the closest thing to a mother Rika ever had. She wanted to help, but being just a pup herself, she didn't know what to do. Rika was distancing herself from her emotions, which had always been her way of coping. If she didn't let herself feel, she couldn't get upset.

X.X.X.

"So, what are the two of you doing for the holidays?" Harry asked, looking up from his and Ron's game of wizard's chess.

"It looks like we're staying here," Cloe answered. The two girls didn't want to go back to the orphanage, knowing that by now their room had been filled with newcomers. "It should be nice. I can't remember ever having a Christmas feast."

"What?" Ron exclaimed, jaw dropping. "My mom makes us a feast every year! How could you have never had one?"

"We just haven't, okay?" Rika snapped, practicing her levitation charm on some of the broken pieces.

"Well, hello kids," Fred chirped, bounding down the stairs.

"We couldn't help overhearing-" George started.

"That the two of you had nowhere to go. So we thought-"

"Since Harry and Hermione are already coming over-"

"You two should join us."

"Mom already said yes," George finished, grinning. "Mom's always happy to have more people to cook for."

Cloe and Rika glanced at each other. Sure, it sounded great, but two weeks with the Gryffindors? What if the night terrors continued, and the Weasley's figured out their secret? Still, it was better than spending the holidays in an empty castle.

"Sure," Cloe agreed as Rika nodded in agreement.

"Just warning you, you'll probably get a sweater as a present," Ron grinned. "It's kinda a tradition."

And this is how, two weeks later, Cloe and Rika found themselves boarding the Hogwarts Express, heading back to spend the holidays at the house of the first people they felt they could consider friends.

X.X.X.

Hige groaned, trying to sit up. Ever since the girls had left for some new type of training, Acuna and Fushigi had been using their extra energy to train the rest of their pack. The injections were doing very little to help them get through the day, and the lack of food rendered him weak. He tried to take over Blade's spot as the alpha and take care of the pups, but he found the job to be more than he could handle.

Sollecks had always been angry, but Blade was able to keep him in line. Without her, he had snapped, almost becoming the perfect warrior Acuna was attempting to mold them all into. Solleks left Hige alone, knowing that the larger wolf would be able to take care of himself. However, Solleks' guard dropped for a few seconds each day, Hige observed. He would look over to Arrow, now the youngest, and try to help.

However, Arrow was damaged beyond repair in the foreseeable future. Acuna had a special punishment for him that neither of the two other males knew about. He used to rely on Kage for support, but with the girl gone, he had mentally collapsed into himself. He was never close to Hige, and it felt wrong to burden him with what Arrow was going through. The older wolf already looked sad enough because he couldn't protect the pups. And Solleks scared him, the grey wolf seemed to thrive off the hatred he felt towards those who kept them enslaved.

Each of the wolves felt the loss of the rest of their pack, but mourning would do them no good. They had to be awake early for training, and they already knew it was going to be a struggle just to stand up the next day.


	10. Chapter 10

Dislaimer: Still don't own…

XxXxXx

As the train came to a stop, the large group that had been riding in one compartment (Fred, George, Harry, Ron, Hermione, Cloe, Ginny, and Rika) met up with Percy Weasley, who was giving Penelope a kiss goodbye. He was met with groans from the group, with the exception of Rika, who was pretending to vomit. He pulled back, his red-head genes making it impossible to hide his blush.

"If you're done making out with you girlfriend," Fred started.

"We're getting ready to leave. And as much as we'd love to leave you on the train," George continued.

"Mom would kill us if we let you go back to Hogwarts," Fred finished, holding the door open as their make-shift clan started making their way off the train.

It was easy for Cloe and Rika to identify the Weasley family. There were four adults, all with bright red hair, waving enthusiastically at the group.

"Mother, must you make a scene?" Percy asked, annoyed.

"Bloddy hell, Percy, loosen up," a male who looked like he belonged at a rock concert nudged the prefect. "I'm Bill, by the way," he started, looking at Cloe and Rika. "And that's Charlie," he pointed to a muscular man behind him.

Instead of shaking hands, a woman came running up to the two girls, wrapping them in a hug. Rika immediately tensed, but Cloe was able to act as if what was happening was normal.

"Oh, you two are so adorable," the woman cooed. "But you're far too skinny! No worries, I'll get you into decent shape by the end of the holidays!"

"That's our mum," Fred explained. "And the guy by Charlie is our dad."

"Um, thanks Mrs. Weasley," Cloe mumbled, not sure how to react to the woman who had just let them go.

"Call me Molly, dear," Mrs. Weasley insisted.

"Well, I'm Cloe and she's Rika," Cloe offered, as the younger girl seemed unlikely to offer an introduction. Molly nodded, moving to give hugs to the rest of their group.

"Now that introductions are out of the way, there is a cab outside waiting to take us home," Mr. Weasley stated, leading the group out of King's Cross Station.

When they got outside, Cloe and Rika thought the man was crazy. The cab waiting for them looked like it might hold one third of their group at most. And when not only the twins, but Bill, Charlie, and Harry had entered, their confusion heightened. When they were able to see inside, they realized that magic was at work again. The interior was the size of a muggle school bus, and there was more than enough room for everybody and their luggage.

"Do you always travel like this?" Cloe asked once she was seated.

"Not always. But we need to because of Sirius Black," Bill explained.

"You don't think a murderer would think something is wrong when thirteen people can fit into a cab?" Rika pointed out, rolling her eyes.

"The bus is also heavily warded, so even if he did see us, he wouldn't be able to harm any of us," Bill responded.

XxXxXx

"We need to find a way to make Percy tolerable," Charlie groaned, looking at his companions. Percy's nonstop chatter about his position as prefect had grinded on everybody's nerves, to the point where Rika and the twins joined Charlie in his room.

"We could have a little fun," Fred suggested, grinning.

"It's getting to the point that I don't think Mum would even get mad at us if it shut him up," George added on.

"What do you have planned?" Rika asked, grinning. Since attending Hogwarts, she found that the Weasley twins were able to come up with ridiculous plots and she had been eager to help with one.

And this is how, half an hour later, Charlie was holding Percy's Prefect Badge, which he had stolen from the younger boy's room. The twins had charmed it to display a picture of Percy and Penelope together in the Prefect's bathroom. Handing the badge to Rika, they explained that she should wait for a few minutes before heading down, so that they could all watch Percy's face.

After waiting the suggested five minutes, Rika walked into the living room before taking a seat next to Percy. Speaking just loud enough so that everyone could hear her, she commented, "I didn't know that the Prefect Badge doubled as porn."

"What?" Both Percy and Mrs. Weasley yelled as Mrs. Weasley grabbed the badge.

"PERCIVAL WEASLEY WHAT IS THIS?" she screeched, causing everyone in the room to cover their ears.

"Mother, I didn't do that, I swear," he pleaded, trying to get the badge back.

"Percy, if you have a girl willing to have sex with you, why would you take the time to take a picture?" Charlie mused, barely able to keep a straight face.

"This never happened!" Percy was looking more distressed by the second, causing the pranksters to start laughing. "You guys did this?"

"Percy, we had to shut you up somehow," Charlie managed to gasp out.

"He's right. You were getting pretty annoying," the twins chorused, Rika nodding her agreement. Even thought Percy looked ready to kill the four culprits, Mrs. Weasley couldn't bring herself to scold them.

XxXxXx

"Our plans are still in place, am I correct?" Acuna asked, taking a sip of his firewhiskey.

"Of course, my dear lad," Dumbledore responded. "I will fund your research as long as you can guarantee that your wolves will be able to help us in defeating the Dark Lord."

"They will not only be able to help, they will be able to kill him on their own," Acuna reassured the old man. "You just need to make sure that you keep an eye on the two of them. They are likely to create complications if left on their own."

"I've already made certain that they were sorted into Gryffindor, where my three most trusted students will be keeping tabs on them for me. They will be made somewhat aware of the situation when they return from their holidays."

"Excellent," Acuna grinned, standing up. "Have a pleasant evening, Albus."

"You as well, Acuna."

XxXxXx

A young male wolf leaned against the side of his cage, muscles twitching despite how exhausted he was. The injection that he had been given ten minutes ago was starting to take effect.

Solleks referred to the drug as "Haze," only having the effects to go off of as Acuna never filled them in on the official names of any of the "performance enhancers" he forced them to take. After being injected, his entire body would tense up, ready for a fight or flight response to anything. The longer he was cooped up, the tighter wound he became. Mentally, it blacked out any sense of reason, including his flight response. When the drug would take over completely, they would release him in an area filled with those he was meant to kill, and his body would perform the task.

In the last minutes he was able to think, he remembered the two missing girls. First and foremost was his older sister, Blade. She was their leader, and as much as Solleks tried to take over that position, he couldn't. Blade had a connection with the remaining wolves that he lacked. While Blade and Hige were almost like siblings, their bond of being the two oldest wolves pushing them together, Solleks and Hige had little in common. Where Blade was able to provide at least a little comfort to Arrow when Kage wasn't around, Solleks failed. The younger pup was terrified of him.

Solleks knew that the fear Arrow held for him was part of Acuna's strategy to keep the wolves from banding together against him. The young wolf seemed to collapse into himself more and more every day, and Solleks couldn't help because he didn't know what special treatment Arrow was exposed to. And due to the steady injection of Haze on most days, Arrow was terrified that Solleks would kill him, so there was almost no way that he could find out what was wrong and comfort Arrow. Only Kage had been able to comfort the pup, and she was gone.

Solleks felt another pang of sadness as he thought about his partner-in-crime. When Kage was still there, the two of them would make life hell for the guards when it seemed the others couldn't take much more. While Blade was physically the strongest, she wasn't able to turn off her emotions like the two pups were able to. Both Solleks and Kage held the ability to completely shut down when necessary, unwittingly falling into the role of a soldier that Acuna wished for them to fill.

There was one good thing about the younger wolf being gone, he supposed. Kage was the daughter of their main abuser, and the twin of the male who came in close second. While Hige seemed to have escaped what seemed to be a genetic predisposition to the need for power, Kage wasn't so lucky. Solleks could remember that gleam of joy at having the power to kill someone if she wished that Kage's eyes held for just a second. One second, and then she had buried it, knowing that her ability to control that one emotion was what kept her from being like her father and twin.


	11. Chapter 11

Disclaimer: Still don't own, so don't sue.

A/N: Every scene is taking place at the same time in this one…

XxXxXx

"How were the holidays with the Gryffindorks?" Draco asked as Rika sat next to him. It had become routine for them to meet up after classes, mainly because Rika got annoyed if she spent too much time with the Golden Trio.

"Decent, I guess. Percy was caught with porn. Mainly due to the twins, me, and their older brother. What about you? How was Christmas at the famous Malfoy Manor?" Rika teased, knowing Draco hated having to deal with the uptight parties his father held.

"Horrendous. The only topic of conversation was the escape of Sirius Black and speculation on whether or not he actually was a servant of the Dark Lord," Draco groaned.

"If he is, he's good. The death eaters aren't sure if he's on their side, so they can't rally behind him and give away his location," Rika commented, tossing a rock out towards the lake.

"I don't want to talk about him anymore," Draco came dangerously close to whining. "It became a boring topic after the first couple weeks here."

"Okay, so what do you want to talk about?" Rika asked, hands searching for another rock to throw.

"How about the fact that Dumbledore is starting to put together an army to take on the Dark Lord," Draco pointed out, leaning back.

"What? Isn't Voldemort dead?" Rika's head snapped towards her companion.

"Yeah. But Dumbledore is getting paranoid. He thinks that the Dark Lord's followers are banding together to find a way to bring him back," Draco explained. "That was the other topic of conversation at father's parties."

XxXxXx

Harry, Ron, and Hermione waited anxiously outside of Dumbledore's office. They had been summoned by the headmaster with orders to not tell anyone of the meeting, especially Cloe and Rika. Once they were granted access, Dumbledore gestured for them to take their seats.

"You are probably wondering why I asked for the three of you to meet with me. It's about your new classmates, Cloe and Rika," the headmaster started, eyes twinkling.

"They're doing fine," Harry pointed out. "What do you need to talk to us for? You could talk to them."

"What I'm about to tell the three of you cannot leave this room. Understood?" Albus was met with three nodding heads. "My sources have informed me that the Death Eaters believe that Voldemort may return earlier than expected. I contacted an associate of mine, and he told me about those two girls.

"Both Cloe and Rika are trained assasins. They've been under a strict training regimen for the majority of their lives. In exchange for a sum of money and their magical training, I was promised that the two of them will assist in killing Voldemort when the time arises."

"I understand why you'd want Harry here, but why are Ron and I here, headmaster?" Hermione questioned.

"You two are here because I need all three of you to watch over them and report to me. Here's the most important part-their memories have been temporarily blocked to prevent them from being a threat to the student body. They cannot know that you are doing this," Dumbledore explained.

"Why us?" Ron whined.

"I had the two of them sorted into Gryffindor precisely so you can watch over them. The three of you are my most trusted students," Dumbledore responded, knowing the praise would cause Ron togo along with the plan.

"So what do you want us to do?" Harry asked.

"As of right now, you just need to make sure that the two of them trust you. Through that trust, you can stay close enough to them to keep a watch on their actions. I want you to let me know immediately if anything seems off about them at any time. I promised my associate that I would make sure they stayed in line while here," Albus looked at the clock. "Well, it looks like curfew is approaching. You three should return to your dormitories."

XxXxXx

Cloe decided to spend the afternoon napping in her room, knowing that the time without the Golden Trio and Rika was about the only quiet time she was going to get. As she fell into a deep sleep, the memories returned.

_~Cloe's Dream~_

_She was looking around frantically. The three pups had disappeared, and neither she nor Hige had any clue as to where they were. That normally meant only one thing-the pups were in trouble, and Acuna didn't want the older wolves to get in the way. _

_Acuna loved to let her and Hige search the keep looking for the pups, laughing as they got more and more frantic. She sniffed the air, panicking when she couldn't catch any scent from the pups besides the dried blood from the "training rooms". Turning a corner, she was surprised when a foot collided with her rib cage, sending her flying into the wall._

"_Having fun?" the guard drawled, looking down at the wolf._

"_Where are they?" she snarled, standing back up._

"_Who?"_

"_The pups. Solleks. Kage. Arrow," she was losing patience, more than half her pack was missing._

"_The boss is the only one who knows. Well, him and his son," the sentence was punctuated with another kick to the ribs, after which she was pulled up by the scruff of her neck._

_She was dragged back to her cage, where Hige was across the hallway, unconscious. The guard threw her in, causing a whimper to escape as the fall aggravated her wounds. Sitting up, she tried desperately to sniff out the three pups. Acuna was a master at this-finding each of their weaknesses and exploiting them for his own amusement. Her biggest weakness was her need to look after her pack, and the loss of the pups was affecting her just as bad as the training she was forced to endure that morning._

_~End Dream~_

She jolted awake, sitting straight up.

XxXxXx

Arrow was curled into himself in the back corner of his cage when they grabbed him for his weekly session with Acuna. He tried to fight back, tried to stay in his cage and away from the hell that was waiting for him, but he was too small, too thin, too weak from exhaustion. As the guard shoved a drink down his throat, he found himself stuck in his human form against his will.

He didn't understand why Acuna took this perverse interest in him. It started when the man had heard him and Kage whispering to each other, when he had heard Arrow admit that he was gay. Arrow thought it wasn't that big of a deal-after all, they were never going to have a chance at romance anyway. But sometimes, he had to talk just to know that he was alive, and that's what came out. Acuna made sure Arrow knew how disgusting he was, which is what confused him about the ordeal he was going to have to face.

How does a man who believes homosexuality is so wrong do what Acuna does to Arrow? Was it only wrong to fall in love with someone of your gender, but okay to sleep with them? Okay to force yourself on them?

This was another aspect of his life only Kage knew about. He couldn't stand to let any of the others know about it. He always felt so dirty after, and he could only stand Kage touching him because he knew it was in comfort and not an attempt to do what Acuna had just finished. With the girl gone, his one source of comfort was gone with her. As he was pulled closer to the older man, he closed his eyes, trying to picture somewhere happy enough to make him forget what was happening.

But he was so young when they were captured. He had no memories of a happier time, lacked the memories that Hige and Blade seemed to use to get through.


	12. Chapter 12

"I should probably get back to the tower," Rika groaned, standing up. "The lions are going to start thinking I've turned dark or something."

"Isn't there a muggle saying about how the dark side has cookies?" Blaise Zambini asked, having joined the two of them a couple hours earlier.

"No fucking clue," Rika stated, starting to walk as Draco handed her a slip of paper.

"Password for the dungeons," he explained. "We'll teach you what the wizarding world is really like, not the rose-tinted view the Gryffindors seem to enjoy."

"Thanks," Rika stared at the piece of paper. "But why do I feel like I'm going to have to do something in return?" Blaise and Draco shared a grin.

"You're our man on the inside, or woman, as it is," Draco started.

"You have to help us with our pranks on the lions, now that we have someone who can get into the tower," Blaise finished.

"Sounds like fun," the young girl smirked. "Although, I must warn you, the twins are going to fight back and they can get creative."

"Just don't let anyone see that piece of paper," Draco ordered.

XxXxXx

"Where were you?" Ron asked as Rika made her way back into the commons.

"Got bored," she commented, taking a seat next to Cloe. She and Harry seemed to be deep into a discussion about quidditch, and she wasn't entirely sure what the look in Cloe's eyes meant. Normally, the older girl would have gotten on her case about disappearing, but she didn't even seem to notice anybody but the black-haired boy.

"Looks like someone has a crush," one of the twins (she wasn't sure which one it was) whispered, causing Rika to look up in confusion.

"What?"

"She's got it bad for him," the other twin explained. "And somebody's jealous." He pointed to Ginny, who was glaring at the two lovebirds from behind the book she was pretending to read.

"Green is not your color," the first twin joked. Ginny flushed bright red when she realized she had been caught, and buried her face further in the book she was holding.

Rika settled back, watching the two interact. Even though she could only remember back to the end of summer, she had a feeling that either she or Cloe had ever had any type of openly romantic interest in anybody. She couldn't figure out what to make of it. On one hand, Cloe looked happy, which was all good. But wouldn't that complicate things? If her dreams were true, there was no way they were going to be able to stay here for the entirety of their schooling. Wouldn't a relationship make Cloe upset when it came time to leave?

However, she was falling into the same trap. Not relationship-wise, but she had been making friends with Draco and recently Blaise. If they had to leave, she'd be upset at having to leave behind the two of them, and whatever Slytherins she happened to meet through "learning what the wizarding world was really all about".

"Oh, Rika, when did you get here?" Cloe asked, finally noticing her friend. However, Rika was so deep in her own thoughts she didn't hear Cloe. "Rika."

"Huh?" she mumbled unintelligibly, finally snapping out of whatever daze she was in.

"Where were you?"

"Got bored," Rika shrugged, watching the way Harry tried to both continue admiring Cloe and observing Rika at the same time.

"That doesn't tell me where you were," Cloe pointed out, her mothering instincts rising back to the surface.

"Just walking around," she snapped, wishing Cloe would go back to talking to Harry. "And Potter, take a fucking picture, it'll last longer." Harry gaped at Rika while Cloe looked back to the boy.

"Rika, be nice," Cloe admonished before continuing their previous discussion.

After another hour of sitting around the common room, Rika returned to the dorm, curling into her bed.

_~Rika's Dream~_

_They had been released. She wasn't sure for how long, but Solleks, Arrow, and herself had been released into a secluded forest. However, none of the pups were able to relax. It was never good when you weren't told exactly what you needed to do._

_As expected, an arrow was embedded into the earth less than a foot away from Kage. She jumped back, automatically scanning the trees for the threat. She felt Solleks and Arrow fall into place to her side and behind her, ready to take on whatever was to jump out at them. _

_As another arrow landed, this time next to Solleks, they started to panic. They couldn't see their attacker in the night, and it was starting to unnerve them._

"_Stay calm," as the oldest, Solleks decided to take charge. "Kage, go to the left, Arrow to the right. I'll go straight ahead. Stay within sight. Once one of us gets the attacker, the other two will join them. Got it?" The two younger pups nodded, starting to jog into their designated areas. _

_Kage heard a rustling as she searched the area before an arrow was implanted in what would have been her shoulder if she was in human form. Looking to her right, she saw a human pulling another arrow from his bag. She yelped, alerting the other two that she had found the target before switching to her human form to allow her to climb the tree. Knocking the human off his perch, she dropped back down in her natural wolf form and aided the two males in killing the target._

_~End Dream~_

Unlike the other dreams, Rika didn't jolt awake. She found herself awake ten minutes later, when the noise of the other girls coming up the stairs became too much for her to sleep through.

Did her nonchalance this time around mean that the killing of a human was nothing new? She was used to waking up in a cold sweat, terrified that the man she had deducted to be her father had somehow made it into Hogwarts.

Half awake, she watched the other girls put their books away before heading to take their showers. Groaning, she flipped over, burying her head in her pillow, trying desperately to get back to sleep.

Cloe was the first done with her shower, and she looked over at Rika's bed before getting in her own. It was one of the first nights that the girl wasn't thrashing around, instead sleeping peacefully. The other girls had no idea of what was going on, as they slept like the dead. Cloe woke up at almost the drop of a pin, so she was woken nightly by the sounds the younger girl was making.

She had to wonder if that was how she sounded when she was sleeping. Her nightmares were just as vivid as she imagined Rika's were, so she assumed that she had thrashed around quite a bit as well.

However, her thoughts quickly turned to Harry. She enjoyed spending time with the boy, and was starting to think that there could be something more than friendship between the two of them. There was just one problem-her dreams didn't give her much help at reading into romantic feelings, and the fact that she couldn't remember anything solid before four months ago left her far behind the others when it came to these types of matters.

She figured she'd let Harry take the lead, and try to figure it out as they went. The only other couple she knew of was Percy and Penelope, and there was no way in hell she was going to model her relationships after the two of them.

XxXxXx

Hige looked around at the new cell. He had been shipped from Acuna's keep to Jagura's, but he couldn't figure out why they had decided to do so. Jagura was one of Acuna's closest "business partners", so she already had the means of watching over the wolves he was training.

Within a few hours of being there, a collar was fixed around his neck. He was told that Acuna knew about it, and it was a new piece of technology they were trying out. It was resistant to most normal ways to destroy electronics (fire, water, explosions…although how she expected it to still be useful through an explosion was beyond him) and would serve as a tracking device. Apparently they had been talking about sending Hige out into the world and using him to track down other wolves. The device would constantly be informing them about his location, and had a built in microphone so they could listen whenever he met a new pack.

As he started to fall asleep, he worried about his own pack. They had never been split up for more than a week. The girls had already been gone for a few months, and it didn't seem like he'd be returning in the near future. That left Solleks and Arrow at Acuna's Keep, and he was starting to fear what the man would come up with to do to them.


	13. Chapter 13

Author's note: Hey guys! Couple things. One-this is a companion piece to Blade-Guardian's "Lost but forgotten? Never". Check it out. Also, I'm basing Theo off of the Theo in IceQueenRia's "Being This Boy", because I don't know much about him but her story was amazing!

XxXxXx

Rika spent most of Friday afternoon with the Slytherins, planning their prank. It had to be perfect, otherwise the fact that she was helping them would be exposed, ruining any future pranks they may plan. For Rika, the afternoon was amazing. With the three boys she had come to think of as friends, she didn't need to worry about what she saw whenever she closed her eyes. The young girl could live in the moment, especially when said moments were filled with plotting ways to prank the Gryffindors.

Finally, she left the dungeons with a two small globes in her pockets. Draco had taught her how to set them off, and she was just waiting for the perfect time. After a few hours of trying to avoid Ron and Hermione's questioning, watching Harry and Cloe flirt, and seeing Ginny sulk in the corner, she headed up to the dormitories with the other girls around midnight.

As soon as she was certain the girls were asleep, she snuck into the boy's dormitory, thankful that the stairs would actually allow someone of the opposite gender to enter. Hiding one of the globes under Harry Potter's bed, where it was least likely to be stepped on, she hurried back to the girls dormitory, hiding the second under Hermione's bed. She whispered the incantation, which would allow half an hour before the globe and its twin exploded, leaving enough time for Rika to fall back asleep.

Half an hour later, a loud bang, almost like a gunshot, was heard throughout the two Gryffindor dormitories. Rika jumped up with the other girls, and pretended to be surprised when she saw that everything had been dyed green and silver, including their clothes, hair, and even skin. Hermione began to panic, and Rika joined in.

"What if none of this comes off?" she questioned, looking around the room, knowing full well the colors would fade after two days.

"It has to. IT HAS TO!" Hermione screamed, opening her trunk to reveal silver and green school robes.

"Do you think the guys got hit, too?" Cloe asked, seeming the calmest out of the girls. Well, except for Rika, who was now trying to curl back into her bed, mumbling something about needing sleep and could the other girls please shut the fuck up?

Cloe and Hermione ran to the boy's room, where they were greeted with the same sight they had just left. The boys, especially Ron, were furious, yelling about how they were going to get the Slytherin's back for this. Rika grinned at the shouts, before crawling back out of the bed. Arriving at the scene, she forced herself to look surprised. "You guys got hit, too?"

"No shit," Ron growled.

The next morning, the Great Hall was filled with snickering as the third years (and Rika) walked to their table, still covered in the silver and green colors of Slytherin. Rika chanced a glance at the table, and smirked at Draco, Blaise, and Theo. Yeah, they were amazing.

XxXxXx

"What about you guys?" Everyone keeps telling me that you're all in training to become Death Eaters," Rika asked. Their group had retreated to the dungeons after breakfast, Rika sneaking down once she had been able to slip away from the Gryffindors. Draco was sitting on his bed, Rika and Theo were lounging on Theo's, and Blaise was laying on his own. Apparently, Slytherins were allowed fewer people to a room. Rika had followed them down, wanting to finally know more about the wizarding world and the Slytherins than she had learned from the naïve Gryffindors.

The group was different than the Gryffindors had told her, and she had already seen that with the prank. Sure, when there were other students around, they were cold and arrogant. But here, in the safety of their dorm, there was no trace of what the rest of the world sees.

Draco was their leader, which extended outside of the small group. According to Theo, Draco had been tutoring and defending the first years when they needed it. He hated his father's connection to Voldemort, and was attempting to create a plan to escape if the Dark Lord ever returned.

When he became overwhelmed, he turned to Theo. Theo and Rika quickly hit it off, because it was almost impossible not to like the boy. He was one of the nicest people she had ever met, and was able to stay bright and bubbly without becoming annoying. He was openly gay, but none of the others treated him differently because of it.

The last was Blaise, who reminded Rika of the twins. His eyes were always sparkling with mischief, but none of his pranks were meant to harm. In fact, his jokes and pranks were meant to lift spirits (mainly those of the Slytherins, but seriously, nobody was hurt during the prank they pulled on the Gryffindors), especially on those nights when the reputation the Slytherins had began to wear on them.

"We're not going to follow the Dark Lord, honey," Theo started. That was another unique quirk he had, he called everyone by whatever pet name happened to pop into his head. "But we're not following Dumbledore, either."

"But then what do you have in mind?" Rika asked, sitting up in the bed.

"Honestly, we're hoping the two of them kill each other in the final battle. The Dark Lord's ideals will lead the wizarding world to ruins, but Dumbledore is too manipulative to have in charge," Draco explained.

"I've seen that. The golden trio met with him last week and now they're always trying to watch me and figure out what I've been doing," Rika informed the group. "Don't worry, I haven't told them anything."

"Exactly. So once the two of them are out of the way, we can rebuild the wizarding world. Not us, but people who will find the balance between the two. Expose Dumbledore. And once that happens, hopefully things will remain peaceful for a while," Draco finished.

"But we need to figure out just what he's up to, and I think you can help," Blaise spoke up. "Stay here for a couple days, but first go back to the towers and get what you'll need. If he starts to panic, we have a better chance of figuring out why he's making them watch you, and hopefully find out what his plans are."

"Better yet, why don't you sit with us at the Slytherin table. That way he knows that there might be something to worry about," Draco added on.

Rika immediately agreed, but started thinking. She felt she could trust the three boys, should she tell them about the memories? Could that be part of the reason Dumbledore was keeping an eye on her? She decided they needed to know what she did, but figured she could leave the role Cloe played out of it.

"What's wrong, dear?" Theo asked, seeing the look on her face.

"Lock the door and put a silencing charm on it. I have to tell you guys something." The others nodded, getting up to do what she said. After they sat back down, she started to speak. And once she started, she couldn't stop.

She told them about the dreams, about the broken memory of her suicide attempt. About her theory that the men were her father and her twin. About her best friend, alone in that hell. And finaly, the confusing fact that many of her dreams included her as a wolf. By the time she finished, the three boys were staring at her.

"Holy shit," Blaise stated after a couple minutes of silence.

"Are you doing okay?" Draco asked. "That was a lot to be holding in."

"I'm…decent," she couldn't bring herself to say she was okay after everything she had just said.

"Oh, baby," Theo cooed, wrapping his arms around Rika, who immediately tensed. "Sorry!" he let go.

"I just…don't like being touched," Rika mumbled. "I just wanted you guys to know in case that's why he's trying to have me watched."

"That's probably the best lead we have," Draco mused. "And change of plans. We're going to look after you, especially after that news."

"I don't need you to protect me," Rika growled, glaring at Draco. "You know damn well I can do that myself."

"Yeah, but we worry about you, even before this," Blaise tried to explain.

"I have to go to the tower every now and then, you know. But I have a friend there, so you don't have to worry. I'll come to you guys if something happens that I can't handle," she compromised.

"That's the best we're going to get, isn't it?" Blaise sighed. "Go get your stuff. We'll be waiting down here."

XxXxXx

Rika stepped into the common rooms, once more faced with the same situation that caused her to leave the night before. Still wearing the dye (she had an antidote, but they had all agreed it was too suspicious if she was the only one it wore off of so quickly), she tried to sneak back into her dorm, but was stopped by Hermione.

"Where were you?" the bushy haired girl demanded, standing up. This seemed to knock Harry and Cloe out of their daze, and they turned to face the first year.

"None of your business," Rika quipped, turning to make it up the stairs. Her plan was simple-shrink her trunk, put it in her pocket, and walk out. If only the others didn't get in her way.

"Rika," Cloe started. "They're just worried about you."

"They weren't until after that meeting they went to last week," Rika pointed out. Cloe seemed to come to the realization as well, and stood up.

"I'll talk to her," she told the others, following Rika up the stairs. After shrinking the trunk, the younger girl turned to face Cloe. "What's up with you lately?"

"Can I trust you not to say anything," Rika asked. When Cloe nodded, she continued. "If you could watch any of them besides Harry, you'd know they're watching us. And whoever held that meeting, most likely Dumbledore, ordered them too. And I can't tell you anything else, other than you don't have to worry about me, because I've found some friends who I trust, and I'm staying with them for a while."

"What about classes?" Cloe questioned.

"I'll still go. I'm just not going to stay in a dorm where people are watching me and thinking they have a right to know what I'm doing all the time. You've got it easy because the golden boy himself likes you. Ron and Hermione hate me, and the only reason Harry doesn't is because he's into you," Rika finished.

"I don't want you out there on your own," Cloe stated.

"Look at the dreams, memories, whatever that I know you've been having. You know I can take care of myself, I've done it before, trust me to do it again. If something happens and you're going to be in danger, I'll let you know," Rika turned and walked out the dorm, then out the common room, and started down the stairs.

Cloe stood in the dorms, debating whether or not to trust the younger girl. In the end, an instinct that told her Rika could in fact take care of herself won out, and she headed to the common rooms.

"She's just mad because she made some other friends and you guys are always on her case," Cloe lied. "She's spending some time with them right now."

XxXxXx

Solleks was out on a mission, but instead of carrying out his duty, he snuck back into the Keep. He knew what he was doing was risky, and the consequences of him being caught could mean death. But he had to know what had happened to his sister and friend.

Security around the computer lab was fairly thin, as almost nobody was able to penetrate the fortress in the first place. Sitting at the first computer he saw, he started scrolling through the history, trying to find some information on where the two female wolves were.

He took too long, however, and the guards noticed him. Acuna came running through the door, and threw Solleks across the room. Picking the twelve-year-old wolf up, he grinned. "You're going to wish you had never been born, boy."

Three hours later, Solleks lay bleeding in his cage, his most severe wounds stitched up to prevent Acuna from losing one of his test subjects. Acuna was right; as he laid there, he wished he had never been born.

But that was nothing new. It was a wish he had since they had entered this hell.


	14. Chapter 14

Author's Note: Once more, this is a prequel/companion story to Blade-Guardian's "Lost but Forgotten? Never". Read it.

XxXxXx

Rika smirked as she sat at the Slytherin table the next morning, wedged "safely" between Draco and Theo. The golden trio (and Cloe) spotted her within a couple minutes, and Ron's face was bright red within seconds of the realization. Cloe looked slightly confused before giving Rika a small smile.

"Nothing too different," Rika noted. "They hate you guys, so it's only natural to be angry when one of their own 'defects'."

"Good point," Blaise stated, finally arriving and taking the seat across from her. He hadn't been awake enough to come with them when the three of them left for breakfast. "The one we want a reaction out of is Dumblebore." Immediately after he spoke, the headmaster entered. Dumbledore took a look at the Slytherin table and, for a second, looked murderously angry.

"That the reaction you were going for?" Rika asked as the man in question once more looked calm.

"Yeah," Draco answered.

"Normally, he'd be promoting house unity," Theo started. "So why would it be different with you?"

"No here," Rika whispered as Draco opened his mouth. "He might see us."

Breakfast was fairly uneventful after that. Once it had ended, Rika followed the Slytherins back to the dungeon. When they were finally settled behind a locked door, they continued their conversation.

"Maybe he made you come here to fight in the war," Blaise suggested.

"Then why not tell me? And why strip me of my memories? And you guys are acting as if the dark lord is still alive," Rika pointed out.

"Hun, it's only a matter of time before he comes back. Even now, though, death eaters are planning to attack Hogwarts in a couple months," Theo explained.

"But I thought magic couldn't bring people back from the dead," Rika muttered.

"So did we."

XxXxXx

"What is she playing at?" Ron asked Cloe, furious.

"She made some friends. Dumbledore's been promoting house unity, Rika decided to give it a try," Cloe honestly hadn't been paying much attention to Ron, more interested in the game of Exploding Snaps she was playing with Harry.

"But them? They're a bunch of creepy, slimy snakes!"

"Drop it Ron. She obviously likes them for some reason, and there's nothing you can do about it."

However, there was. The next morning, Dumbledore instated a rule that made each student required to sit with their respective houses during meals.

"Why would you want to sit over there, anyway?" Ron asked, shoving a piece of toast into his mouth.

"One, you're disgusting. Learn how to eat like a human. Two, why the hell do you care?" Rika snarled, clearly in a horrible mood after being forced to sit with the Gryffindors.

Dumbledore probably thought he now had her safely within his rule. Being in different years, she wasn't able to use class time to contact the Slytherins. But she knew he couldn't perevent all forms of communication without looking suspicious.

"Rika, be nice," Cloe admonished, earning a glare. "And Ron, lay off." Cloe was beginning to see signs of what Rika was talking about when she said Dumbledore was having the golden trio keep an eye on them.

"I have a question. Why would Dumbledore, after apparently years of lecturing you guys about house unity, suddenly decide it's mandatory to sit with our houses the day after I'm seen sitting with the Slytherins?" Rika smirked, knowing they couldn't come up with a logical answer.

"I'm sure he has his reasons," Hermione snipped.

_Like what, _Rika wanted to say. _Like it making it difficult to keep track of his weapons? _But she remained silent, choosing to push around the food on her plate.

XxXxXx

In between classes, Theo pulled Rika into a broom cupboard, stepping back immediately so she wouldn't panic too much.

"What the hell?" she demanded, glaring at her companion.

"Sorry hun. But we only have a couple of minutes, and I needed to give you this," he handed her a notebook. "The different colored pages are for us. Green is Draco, blue is Blaise, red is me. White is for the group. Whatever you write will show up in your section of that person's notebook. Draco charmed it so nobody else will be able to read it."

"Isn't this a bit much?" Rika questioned, flipping through the pages.

"No. There's a war coming, and we need to be ready. We only have a couple months, and with Dumbledore keeping his eye on you, this is the best way to figure out when we'll meet up," Theo explained. "Just don't lose it."

And with that he left the closet, making his way to his next class.

XxXxXx

That night found Rika laying in her bed, flipping through the pages of the still blank notebook. She was about ready to put it in her bag and fall asleep when Cloe entered the room.

"What the hell is going on with you?" the older girl demanded, sitting on the foot of Rika's bed.

"Just don't like these guys," Rika mumbled, glaring at Cloe. "Unlike you, I'm not completely head over heels for one of them, so it makes the group as a whole fairly intolerable."

"I thought we were going to figure out what's going on together. Not one of us takes off and leaves the other in the dust," Cloe pointed out.

"Look, I can't tell you what's going on right now. If shit gets crazy, I'll let you know. For now, just make sure you don't get too attached to Potter. He's Dumbledore's puppet." Rika put her notebook in her bag before crawling under the covers, making sure there was no doubt that the conversation was over.

Cloe growled slightly before walking back down to the common rooms and facing Harry, Ron, and Hermione. If the younger girl wasn't going to tell her what was going on, she'd find out for herself.

"Why are you watching me and Rika?" she asked calmly as she took her seat next to Harry.

"What makes you think we're watching you?" Hermione countered, not looking up from her book.

"Ever since that meeting, you guys have been wanting to know where the two of us, especially Rika, have been at all times," Cloe pointed out.

"You guys are new. We just wanted to make sure you weren't getting into trouble. That's what Dumbledore wanted to talk to us about," Harry tried to placate the girl, but she wouldn't give in.

"If he's so worried about us fitting in, why doesn't he say so himself? And I have you guys, she has the Slytherins, so we're both fitting in and staying out of trouble."

"Look, those snakes are a bad influence on her, okay? We didn't want them messing with Rika," Ron grumbled.

XxXxXx


	15. Chapter 15

Author's note: This chapter is…odd. The most I can say is that I just spent half an hour dancing to Glee music, and this is what came from that… Also, this all takes place within the notebook. It's a short one, but the next chappie will have more than enough ^_^

XxXxXx

**Rika: **You guys up?

**Draco: **I am, Theo's grabbing his notebook. And waking up Blaise.

**Blaise: **Don't think I don't know you told him to use _Aquamenti _on me to wake me up, Draco.

**Rika: **If only the rest of the school could read this.

**Draco: **Which is one of the reasons I charmed it so no one else can read this. I'm not having you show this around as some form of a joke.

**Theo: **She wouldn't do that to us, would you dear?

**Rika: **Oh yes I would.

**Blaise: **Great, she's becoming a true Slytherin.

**Draco: **What did you want to take to us about? Or were you planning on waking us up just to annoy us.

**Blaise: **If that's the case, I'm marching up to the Gryffindor Tower myself to get back at you, Rika.

**Rika: **Don't worry, it's not. But there is something that I don't know if it'll help or become a problem later on.

**Theo: **What?

**Rika: **It's my friend Cloe. She wants to know what's up, and I think she could help. But she's too close to the golden trio for me to be able to tell her without talking to you guys first.

**Draco: **Is she…like you?

**Rika: **Yeah. I told her Dumbledore's watching the two of us, but that's it. She's somewhat wary of the trio right now, but she's still close to Potter.

**Blaise: **And Potter's pretty much living in Dumbledore's pocket.

**Theo: **Gross! Thanks for putting that image in my head, Zambini.

**Blaise: **I was in no way insinuating that Potter was anywhere near the headmaster's balls. You came up with that yourself.

**Rika: **Are you guys always like this in the middle of the night?

**Draco: **You haven't figured that out yet?

**Rika: **Touche. Anyways, do you guys think I should tell her about what's going on? She might be able to help me keep an eye on the trio. When I'm around its pretty much Ron bitching.

**Blaise: **I think it's a good idea. And we could shut Ron up for you…

**Draco: **Blaise, we're supposed to stay out of trouble until the battle, remember?

**Blaise: **I hate you.

**Theo: **So, anything else we need to figure out from Dumbledore?

**Rika: **Yeah. Why did he just pick the two of us? From what I've dreamed, there were five of us being trained. Me, Cloe, Cloe's younger brother, my best friend, and my older brother. Why just the two of us?

**Draco: **You know names or anything?

**Rika: **I think my friend's name is Arrow. Beyond that, no. I miss them like hell and I can only remember what they look like and a little of what went on.

**Theo: **Now I want to give you a hug. Damn. But then you'd probably hit me. Sometimes I hate you hun. You ruin my thought processes by ending them with something painful.

**Draco: **Theo, are you drunk?

**Blaise: **He must be tired. He rambles when tired.

**Rika: **I am trying my best to convey a blank face on the paper, but it isn't working too well.

**Theo: **All of you can screw off. I'm tired.

**Draco: **Go to bed. This will be on paper in the morning for you to read.

**Theo: **Good night Rika.

**Rika: **Night Theo.

**Blaise: **What, no good night for me?

**Theo: **You're sitting next to me, dumbass. I can say it to you.

**Draco: **In all seriousness, we need to figure out what we're going to do when the death eaters get here. Theo's safe because his family isn't involved in it. But Blaise and I are going to be screwed once they see us fighting against them.

**Rika: **I never thought about that. Do you have someplace unplottable that you can get to?

**Draco: **Short of living in the Room of Requirement, no.

**Blaise: **Theo has a property in Germany. It's unplottable, and his family doesn't have it on any records. We can go there.

**Rika: **Do you guys have everything you're going to need to take with you?

**Draco: **I've got everything, but no way to take it with me with no notice.

**Blaise: **Then there's the problem of making it so that we can get out of the battle alive and well enough to disapparate.

**Rika: **You guys have realized that we'll probably lose, too?

**Draco: **As soon as we started this plan we knew it was a suicide mission. It was either going to end in our deaths or us going into hiding.

**Blaise: **Theo's got it the worst. His parents are actually pretty cool, and he knows he's never going to see them again. That's part of why he tries to be so happy all the time. If he isn't happy, I think he'd fall apart.

**Rika: **Damn. We need to figure out a way to win this. You guys don't deserve to deal with this shit.

**Draco: **We've been trying, but numbers and surprise are in their favor.

**Rika: **Why don't you just tell Dumbledore about the attack?

**Blaise: **Believe me, I've tried. But I'm a Slytherin. All three of us are, and he knows you hang out with us. He won't believe it. Unless it comes from Harry Potter's mouth, he won't believe anything.

**Rika: **I'm going to talk to Cloe tomorrow. With what we were trained to do, hopefully instinct will help us figure out something. I'll let you know how it goes tomorrow night.

XxXxXx

Author's note: Like I said, this one is pretty short. But the next one should make up for it!


	16. Chapter 16

Author's Note: Like I said, we're reaching the end here! I've only got three chapters after this planned out…

XxXxXx

As usual, the next morning Rika woke up earlier than the rest of the girls. She left Cloe a note telling her how to enter the Room of Requirement, and instructed her to feign an illness in order to "escape" from the trio. After she was done, she walked to said room and waited. Luckily, the room had read her need for something to do and provided her with some targets to practice the hexes the Slytherins had taught her.

"What's going on?" Cloe asked as she entered the room, narrowly escaping being hit by a stray curse when Rika jumped in surprise.

"I need to tell you something, but it's going to take a while," Rika mumbled, taking a seat in one of the bean bag chairs. "I told Draco, Theo, and Blaise about us."

"What the hell, Rika?" Cloe snarled. "You better have a damn good explanation for that!"

"I didn't tell them about you until last night. When I found out Dumbledore was keeping an eye on us, I went to them and we think we know why. He's keeping us as weapons, Cloe!" Rika yelled.

"Why do you think that's it? Yes, they're watching us, I realize that. But as weapons?"

"Think about it. Dumbledore knows there's a fight coming, and it just happens to be the year we're here? And the memories? I don't know about you, but I know I'm capable of killing," Rika stated.

"What's this war, then?" Cloe asked.

"Death eaters are planning to attack the school before the year ends. We are planning to fight against them-me, Draco, Blaise, Theo. Draco's reaching out to the Slytherins that have already graduated but he thinks would help up. We want you to join as well.

"Why are you guys only getting Slytherins?" Cloe questioned.

"They tried to tell Dumbledore, but he won't talk to them or protect them. Slytherin isn't taken care of the same way as Gryffindor," Rika explained. "And I'm going to fight to protect them. They're my friends. And we know that we can't win the way we are, but once the battle starts, their lives are over. Just because they're fighting, Draco and Blaise's parents are going to turn against them. If they live and we win, they'll still have to go into hiding. Theo'll join them, but he'll have to abandon his family."

"You're forgetting that others are going to fight. The teachers are going to fight back. It's not just you guys, even if the stakes are higher for them," Cloe pointed out.

"Are you going to fight with us?" Rika asked, avoiding the need to answer Cloe's question.

"Yes, I'll fight," Cloe agreed.

"Don't tell Harry."

"I won't tell him about the battle. But I'm going to tell him about the memories."

"Are you sure that's a good idea?"

"Not at all."

XxXxXx

"Harry, I need to talk to you," Cloe whispered, sitting down next to her friend.

"Here or in private?"

"Private. Follow me," she led him to the Room of Requirement, figuring that would be the one place where nobody would be able to overhear what she was about to say. "I'm a…wolf," she trailed off, knowing how stupid it sounded.

"What the hell? Nice joke, Cloe, but what did you really want to talk about?" Harry looked annoyed.

"I am. I don't know how. But all of my memories include either me as a wolf or making the conscious decision to become a human."

"You must really think I'm dumb. I know for a fact your memories were cleaned. Dumbledore told us. You're just making shit up," Harry snarled.

"Harry, please! You're the only person I've told!" Technically true, as Rika figured it out through her own memories. "You know I wouldn't make something like this up!" She was stopped by the slap Harry delivered to her face.

"Shut the fuck up. Even if that's true, that means you're just a beast," Harry grinned. I can do whatever I want to you because you're not even human." With a flick of his wand, he bound Cloe's arms to the wall.

"What the hell? Fuck this!" Cloe screamed, trying to free her arms. As Harry came closer, she managed to kick him in the stomach. As a result, the bonds on her arms started to burn and her legs felt like lead.

Half an hour later, she was on the floor, tears falling but no sound escaped her lips. He had taken the last of her innocence from her and left. How was the possibly the same boy she had been playing exploding snaps with just days before?

XxXxXx

Harry started to panic shortly after leaving the Room of Requirement. What if Cloe told anybody about what he did? Would anybody believe her? Instead of heading back to the common room, he went to the locker room by the Quidditch pitch. He had to clean off, otherwise people would get suspicious.

People won't believe her, he decided. He was the golden boy, the boy who live, the savior of the wizarding world. As long as he could play it cool, no one would believe her.

XxXxXx

Rika shot out of bed when Cloe finally returned. "How did he-" she cut herself off wit one look over her friend. Her voice dropped down to a snarl, "What the fuck did he do?"

"Nothing," Cloe mumbled, digging through her trunk for a change of clothes.

"Cut the shit," Rika's eyes widened when she got close enough to smell the other girl. "He's dead," she stated, turning to leave.

"Rika, stay put," Cloe ordered, voice shaking. "All I want right now is a hot shower and to not worry about you getting into trouble."

"But he raped you," Rika countered, as if that excused anything she was going to do to Harry. In her mind, it did. "He hurt you and he's just going to get away with it?"

"For now, yes. I'm going to get him during the battle. And you are not going to tell anyone about this," the older girl ordered, walking towards the bathroom. As soon as Cloe was out of sight, Rika left to stand outside the entrance to the Gryffindor tower, waiting for Harry to show. She couldn't remember being this angry before, and the boy was going to pay. As soon as he entered her view, she ran into him, tackling him into a room hidden by a tapestry.

"What the hell?" Harry tried to push her off, but the petite girl was stronger than she looked. Not to mention, she had a look in her eyes that told him that, as angry as she was, she was still in control and would enjoy killing him at that moment.

"You thought nobody was going to find out?" Rika snarled, wrapping a hand around Harry's throat. His eyes widened, hands reaching up to pull Rika's hand away. "Oh, you think I'm going to kill you? No, that's too good for someone like you. This is just a warning." She stood and left, not caring that there was now a hand shaped bruise on his neck.

If he told, so would she.

XxXxXx

Cloe sat in the common room, playing wizard chess with one of the first years. She quickly found that being alone gave her too much time to think. Too much time to remember. And she knew that the more she though, the harder it would be to go after Harry, to rip him apart like every instinct in her body was telling her to.

She looked up as Rika walked in, face set into a satisfied smirk. She had done something. Rika took a seat next to her, looking at the older girl with concern. Cloe gave a small smile before refocusing on the game.

Harry Potter would pay later. Now? Now was a time for healing.


	17. Chapter 17

Author's Note: This could get a little confusing later on, but here's the best I could do-

_Italics: Rika's Flashbacks_

**Bold: Cloe's Flashbacks**

XxXxXx

The next two months were fairly uneventful. Cloe began meeting with the Slytherins and Rika in preparation for the upcoming battle. The five of them split their time between teaching the girls new spell and the guys learning how to fight.

In the Gryffindor tower, Cloe and Rika stuck together in order to prevent Harry from trying anything else. They were only there from curfew to breakfast, and the golden trio was panicking. They had no way of following Dumbledore's orders and keeping an eye on them.

However, there was one time every week when the two girls would have to face at least Harry, and that was Quidditch practice. Practices were tense, and if Rika and Cloe had to be near the boy who lived, the tension was almost tangible.

XxXxXx

The practice had begun as normal, with Ron and Hermione sitting in the stands. However, halfway in, the Slytherins entered the field, and the girls tensed up. Draco had figured out what Harry had done on his own, and let Blaise and Theo in on their secret. The three Slytherins (Theo wasn't on the team, but he liked to watch) looked murderous once they spotted Harry.

"Calm down," Cloe whispered, walking up to them. Draco nodded, but refused to take his eyes off the boy.

"Wood! We're just going to take this end of the field," Flint told the Gryffindor captain.

"We signed out the field today. You need to leave," Wood countered.

"Dumbass, Dumbledore double-booked the pitch again," Blaise snickered.

"Let me see that paper," Wood growled.

"So Potter, attack any more women lately?" Draco sneered, just loud enough for Potter to hear.

"What was that, Malfoy?" Harry snarled, turning and shoving Draco to the ground. Within seconds, Blaise, Theo, Cloe, and Rika had their wands out, ready to fight. Soon after, Draco was on his feet, nad the line was clear. Gryffindors on one side, Slytherins, Cloe, and Rika on the other. Ron started the battle.

"Stupefy!" he cried, hitting Crabbe. With that, everyone broke off into groups. Cloe and Harry, Blaise and Hermione, Ron and Draco, Rika and Theo against the Weasley twins. Everyone else had partnered up, but it was impossible to tell who was fighting who in the chaos.

"And to think, I thought the two of you were decent," Rika growled, instinct kicking in, allowing her to dodge attacks like she had done so a million times before.

_A young wolf, dodging bullets as she tried to reach her fallen friend…_

Cloe faced Harry, happy to finally be able to exercise some form of power over him. She refused to be a victim any longer.

**The leader of their pack, fighting Acuna in order to feel less helpless about what they were going through…**

Rika slipped up, losing focus by checking on Theo. A slicing jinx from one of the twins hit the side of her leg, causing her to stumble before regaining balance and sending a hex in return.

"_Try running again, bitch," a guard snickered, digging into her leg…_

Cloe was so focused on fighting Harry, she didn't think about Ron and Blaise fighting behind her until she was hit by a stinging hex Blaise had been able to dodge.

**She was facing Acuna, trying not to show her fear. She didn't realize there was a man behind her until she felt the needle in her neck…**

_Her screams didn't reach anyone who could help. As the needle sewed the gash on her wrist, she wished more than ever that she had succeeded…_

**Her body wouldn't stop shaking. The last injection was being rejected…**

The two of them were still fighting, but instinct had taken over. Their minds were caught in a series of flashbacks.

_She didn't want to kill. She just wanted to be free, to be back with the pack she had heard about from Blade…_

**All she could register was pain. Every subtle movement, even breathing, seemed to set some part of her body on fire…**

_Pure rage the first time she realized what Acuna had done to Arrow. The need to hurt her father, the pleasure she got from picturing him on the floor, bleeding, would have terrified her younger self…_

**Returning from a mission, only to realize that her younger brother was suffering from fits, and that he had been conditioned to lash out at the nearest person…**

"_Kage"_

"**Blade"**

Snap.

The two girls disappeared, and in their place were two snarling wolves. Any sense of right and wrong seemed to disappear with the human forms, but as they were about to lunge at Harry, two stunning spells hit them from behind.

Draco, Theo, and Blaise spun around, ready to retaliate, only to find that it was Professor Lupin.

"What the hell is going on?" he screamed, forming a barrier between the two groups.

"Ennervate," Draco and Theo mumbled, allowing the two wolves to stand before switching back to their human forms.

"Ask the golden boy," Blaise sneered.

"Harry?"

"Malfoy provoked me, sir," Harry stated, trying to look innocent.

"Bullshit," Kage growled.

"Language, Rika," Lupin admonished.

"My name's Kage, dumbass," Kage replied, rolling her eyes. "And your golden boy over there is a fucking rapist."

"Kage-" Blade tried to interject, before deciding that it wasn't worth it to protect Harry.

"That's why he attacked me first, Professor," Draco was trying his best to keep his voice respectful. "I asked him if he's attacked any women lately."

"Professor, they're lying," Harry exclaimed, trying to defend himself.

"Look at Blade's wrists," Kage told Lupin. "When he chained her, it caused some scarring."

"What the hell? These guys are just making stuff up, it's obvious they hate us," Ron yelled.

"Does it hurt? Bending over to kiss Harry's ass all the time?" Blaise mused, looking at Ron.

"It's gotten past the point of it hurting. That's his natural position now," Theo added on, before turning to Kage. "Honey, are you okay? That slicing jinx looks painful."

"I'm fine. I'll take care of it once we get done here," Kage answered. "Although I was surprised that the whole transition thing didn't actually hurt. Strange."

"Now is not the time, Kage," Blade ordered, before turning to Lupin. "What do we need to do now?"

"I'm going to bring all of you to Dumbledore-"

"No. He's been telling the three of them to keep a watch on Clo…I mean, Blade and Kage," Draco interjected. "The less this has to do with him, the better."

"Can't we just get an auror over here? They can look at Blade's scars, and take Harry in. Then you can take care of detention or whatever else needs to get done," Blaise asked. "Oh, and a trip to the hospital wing so that we can take care of any injuries."

"No time for that, dear," Theo mumbled, pointing at the top of the castle, where a Dark Mark was hovering. "They're here."


	18. Chapter 18

Author's Note: Last real chapter. The next is going to be an epilogue of sorts, but this wraps up the plot.

There are a couple lines that go /text/. If you've seen Wolf's Rain, it will make sense. If you haven't, this is when a wolf speaks, but it is only heard inside of the minds of those who it is meant to be heard by. Shitty explanation, but I don't really know how to explain it.

XxXxXx

"Shit," Kage growled as the rest of the Gryffindors, minus Blade, looked confused.

"Wait, you knew the Death Eaters were going to arrive?" Hermione questioned, looking livid. "Why didn't you tell anybody?"

"We told Dumbledore, dumbass. He chose not to believe us because we're Slytherins," Draco sneered, turning around. "Kage, this may sting a bit." He cast a healing charm on Kage's leg, and the young girl watched in fascination as her skin mended itself right in front of her eyes.

"Now what? We weren't prepared for this," Theo whispered, terror in his eyes.

Up until now, the battle hadn't seemed real. What he was going to be required to give up hadn't seemed real. Yes, he knew the plan to the letter. After the battle, anyone who survived would go to his house, cast a memory charm on his parents, and give them a plane ticket to America. But he wasn't ready to leave them behind. He was still a kid, just thirteen years old, and he needed his parents. But they couldn't find another way to keep the three of them together.

"Fight or die, I guess," Blaise mumbled, turning to face the castle.

He knew chances were likely he'd come face to face with his father in the battle. Hell, he knew that he might have to be the one to kill his father. But up until now, he hadn't really thought about the power that the five of them were up against. Did they even stand a chance? Or was this a suicide mission that they had concocted, and this was going to be the last time they ever saw each other alive?

"Stick together," Draco ordered, voice shaking.

He was shit-in-his-pants terrified. They weren't supposed to get here so quickly! There was still so much they needed to know before they were ready to fight. Sure, he knew that the professors would be on their side, but would any of them, aside from Snape, care if the five of them got caught in the crossfire? Would any of them protect him and his friends if it came down to it? He ordered them to stick together because, as horrible as it would be to see his friends die, it would be even worse not knowing how they were doing.

Blade and Kage nodded, heading the charge back into the castle.

Blade knew what had to be done, but she didn't like it. Once more, she was leading a group into a life-or-death battle, a group of kids way too young to be involved in this type of warfare. And she was so vulnerable here, exposed to weapons that she had no idea the true potential of. Wands could create anything, and an army of Death Eaters against a few kids who didn't know enough about spells and a group of professors? It didn't appear to be much of a match, and not in their favor.

Kage was torn. On the one hand, the small bit of the pup that had managed to stay alive, she was terrified. Terrified that she'd lose three of the only friends she'd ever known, terrified that this could be the end for her. The other side of her, the side that had been groomed to be a killer since she could remember, was ecstatic. Here was a chance to use her skills, to inflict even a small amount of the pain she had been through on another person. This side scared her, but she latched onto it, knowing that it might be the only thing that saves her.

Entering the castle with Lupin and the Gryffindors behind them, the young warriors stopped. The Death Eaters hadn't reached this area, but the sounds coming from all around them let them know that they were spread throughout the castle.

"Now what? We can't split up you guys," Theo was looking around, trying to find out where to go next.

"Tower. We can reach more people from there, and there's more cover than if we were out in the open," Blade stated, turning to run up the stairs. "Take out anybody you see on the way."

"I'll take the rear," Kage added. "If anything happens, I can fight and meet you guys at the tower."

And so they took off, Lupin and the Gryffindors yelling from behind them before being ambused by Dolohov, who began a duel with the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor.

"Shit," Blaise swore as he glanced behind them-Crabbe's father was following them, wand out and ready to jinx. Out of nowhere, a wolf was once more standing in the space that Kage had previously occupied, and the animal was brutal. Kage leapt at the man, digging her fangs into his throat. When she was satisfied that he was no longer breathing, she let go and sprinted up the staircase, catching up to the rest of her group.

By the time they reached the top, even Blade was gasping for breath. As she peered out one of the windows, she realized they were coming from all directions, not just from the main entrance. Of course not, that would be too easy.

"Blaise, Draco, you're with me in the north windows. Kage, Theo, south. Yell if you're having problems, the person to your right will come to your aid. Got it?" She knew that Draco was supposed to be in charge, but it looked like he had no problems with handing over that leadership to someone who had an idea of what they were doing.

Taking their stations, the five students began firing any spells they could think of to delay or injure Voldemort's followers. It wasn't that they couldn't bring themselves to kill, but that they lacked the skill it took to perform such spells. The Death Eaters, however, did not. Five minutes into their attack, the robed wizards noticed their hide out and began firing. All five of them screamed "_PROTEGO!_" at the top of their lungs, but when their voices died down, they realized an extremely important fact.

Blaise wasn't moving.

He was on his back in the middle of the floor, eyes open but lacking their usual laughter. His face was pulled into an expression of terror, the fear that had delayed his reaction by just one second, and it proved to be his end. Theo, who had always been the most emotional of the group, dropped down to grab Blaise as Draco cast the final spell, shielding each window from harm.

"Blaise, you gotta wake up! C'mon, dear, just get up!" Theo was screaming, shaking Blaise's corpse. Draco had fallen to his knees where he stood, staring at his friend's body as if he couldn't believe what he had just witnessed. Kage fought back tears as she refused to look, fighting to regain the composure that she normally had. Blade finally knelt down, taking Blaise from Theo's hands, and helping the hysterical boy to his feet.

"We need to get out of here, we were stupid to think we could do this and look what it did to Blaise," Draco managed to get out through the sobs that were starting to erupt. "We're all going to die if we can't get out of here."

Kage nodded, moving to help Draco back to his feet, her hands shaking slightly as she stood face to face with the blonde.

"How c-can we get out, th-though?" Theo sobbed. "We're surrounded!"

"Kage and I are going to change. Grab onto our necks when we're wolves and don't let go no matter what. We're going to get out of here," Blade ordered, walking towards Draco. The two of them were the biggest, and it didn't make sense for Kage, as small as she was, to carry him. "We meet back up at the Shrieking Shack."

After the two girls changed forms, Draco and Theo climbed on, Theo shaking to the point that he could barely grip onto Kage's neck.

/Theo, you need to calm down. Take a few deep breaths, grab on, and don't fucking let go,/ Kage ordered, turning her head so she could see the older boy. Theo nodded and, a couple seconds later, grasped her neck with newly found strength.

/Alright, let's get out of here,/ Blade took off first, running to her full potential for the first time in almost a year. Kage was right behind her, speed making up for her shorter strides due to her size.

They made it down the stairs without trouble, but when it came to getting to the grounds, they ran into two Death Eaters who had their wands raised. Blade and Kage prepared to fight before they heard Theo's voice.

"_AVADA KEDAVRA_!" He screamed twice, and after the bright green light had faded, the four of them were racing past the corpses of two Death Eaters.

When they finally made it to the Shrieking Shack, Theo was almost as green as the light.

"I just…I," he knelt over and emptied his stomach, groaning.

"Relax," Kage whispered, now back in her human form. "You did what you had to. We're safe, we're out of the castle, now we just have to go through with the rest of the plan." Theo nodded, looking up from the ground. Blade and Draco were going over the best way to get to Theo's house from where they were, and they were out of ideas.

"The only way we have to get there that isn't traceable is brooms, and that's a ride of a few hours," Draco pointed out. "We're lucky your parents are actually okay with Muggles. Call them and tell them to Floo to the Hog's Head. We'll meet them there."

Theo nodded, hand shaking as he brought the phone Draco offered him (He must have grabbed it before they went to the pitch, Theo realized), and his eyes were filling with tears as he waited for them to pick up.

"Hi, mom? Listen, we need you to Floo to Hog's Head, we'll meet you there. Yes, you and dad. No, we're not in trouble at school…Mom, the Death Eaters came. We got out, but they killed Blaise," he choked back a sob. "Just please, get here. Thanks. I love you." Looking back at the other three after hanging up, he started to cry again. "I don't know if I can do this. I can't lose them, I just can't."

Those words hung in the air as they all tried to think of something to say to ease the boy's suffering.

"Maybe you don't have to. You could disappear with them in America, and take Draco with you. Use charms to disguise yourselves, and pass Draco off as your brother," Kage offered, wishing that she had a parent she felt that strongly about.

"Draco, what do you think?" Blade asked, wondering why they hadn't come up with that solution earlier.

"If they agree, I'm in," he answered. "But what about the two of you?"

"We have our own family to find," Blade stated, nodding at Kage. When they reached the Hog's Head, the four of them faced Theo's family, and they knew this was it. There was a chance they would never see each other again.

It was hard to tell who stepped forward first. All four kids embraced, holding each other as tightly as possible. No words needed to be said. No words could possibly communicate how they felt about each other, about leaving the little family they had created. No words could express the pain they felt due to the death of Blaise, the happiness they felt just knowing each other, and the loneliness that had already set in knowing that their family was going to be split apart in a matter of seconds.

As Theo, Draco, and Theo's parents disappeared into the fire, they planned to reemerge in Germany before taking the first flight to New York City. There they would start their new lives as John, Andrew, Marissa, and Steve.

XxXxXx

Blade and Kage remained for several minutes, trying to pull themselves back together. They had a mission, they had to find the rest of their pack and free them from Acuna. But none of that mattered. All that mattered as they stepped out the door were the fresh wounds of Blaise's death and Draco and Theo's departure. They were so lost in their heads they didn't even see the man in front of them until it was too late.

The last thing they registered was the sensation of needles digging into their necks.


	19. Chapter 19

Author's Note: If you've read to this point, thank you! This is immediately before Blade-Guardian's "Lost But Forgotten? Never". If you haven't read it yet, check it out!

Also, I'm doing an AU with these characters and the ones from Wolf's Rain. Any suggestions of what you'd like to see, leave in a comment (mainly talking to you, Blade-Guardian ^_^).

XxXxXx

"Andrew, wait up!" Draco yelled, still not used to Theo's new name. His friend turned around, smirking.

"Can't keep up, blondie?" he teased. Draco's name had become 'blondie' within a couple days of starting muggle school, and as a bonus point, it annoyed Draco to no end. And as much as the boy wanted to get home and break down, he couldn't let down his mask in public.

The two of them had been enrolled as freshman in a muggle high school when the new school year began, under the fake names of Andrew and John Stevenson. They couldn't risk enrolling in another wizarding school, not with the Death Eaters on the watch for them. In fact, they had no contact with the wizarding world ever since the night of that battle five months ago.

With the trace still on them, it was impossible for anybody in their household to use magic. Not only was underage magic illegal, but the trace would let the Ministry know if anyone was to use magic around them until they were seventeen. So their magical education had come to a halt, only furthered by the books they already had.

None of them knew what had happened in the aftermath of the attack. They couldn't risk returning to the wizarding world for news, so they could only hope for the best. The only thing they had been able to find out before leaving the country was that Severus Snape had been revealed as a spy for the light and had been killed. But they kept a look at the muggle news, watching for any signs that the Death Eaters had reached America, or that Voldemort had returned. Thankfully, there were no signs of either.

However, two of the hardest things to live with were still Blaise's death and the loss of Kage and Blade. Both boys still had nightmares about that night, but they weren't of the battle. They were of Blaise's corpse, laying not five feet away from them. They were speculation of what had happened to their friends after they had flooed to safety.

The new identities were almost as difficult to live with. Draco was able to call Theo Andrew in public, but there was always that second of hesitation. Theo couldn't bring himself to refer to his friend by his alias. It seemed like they were turning their back on their past. As much as both teenagers wanted to forget the events of that night, neither one was willing to forfeit the memories of their three closest friends. So, when they were in the safety of their own home, they referred to each other as Draco and Theo.

So they took to running after classes. Running gave them a way to pretend that they could escape their problems, pretend for even an hour that their lives were normal. But some days, like today, everything was too much, and they'd run from school straight to their house, where they would lay in their shared room, waiting for the other to speak first.

"I miss them," Draco whispered, the first to break the silence.

"Me too. I keep expecting Blaise to come running towards us, ready to carry out whatever prank he had planned. Or Kage to sneak into our room and complain about the Gryffindors. Or Blade to set us back on track when we lost focus," Theo mumbled, staring at the ceiling. The boys couldn't look at each other. It became too real then, it became too obvious that they and Theo's parents were all they had left.

Because that night had changed everything. And as much as they wished they could go back to before, they knew they would never be able to. Dreams were nice, but when they awoke, Blaise was still dead, their friends were still gone.

They were still broken.

XxXxXx

The last five months had been hell. The two wolves had been returned to Acuna's Keep, only to find that one of their pack was missing-Arrow. They had lost it that night, especially when they had been told that they weren't allowed to know his whereabouts. That could only mean one thing-Acuna had decided Arrow was better fit for a different use than a soldier, and chances were they would never see him again.

Blade struck out with violence. Harnessing every bit of the killer that she was trained to be, she lashed out at the guards holding them back. Words couldn't express what she was going through, so she didn't yell anything at the man who looked on, amused. She didn't notice how his gaze narrowed when it was directed towards the younger girl, as one of the guards was finally able to sedate her.

Kage lost it in a way she never had before. She started sobbing. Crumpling to the ground, she cried for everything that had happened in the last few days. All of her training left her as she mourned the loss of her best friend, along with the death of Blaise and the loss of two people she considered to be almost like brothers.

It was that day that they learned the curse of happiness. Yes, it was amazing while you had it. Those months with the Slytherins were amazing, but once it was gone, it left you worse off than before. And for the two girls, who hadn't been shown kindness in so long aside from in their small pack, the loss of that happiness was devastating. If they had never been shown how good life could be, they would have never had to mourn the loss of that illusion. But they were, and now they suffered.

Sollecks and Hige had no idea how to comfort their siblings. All they could do was lend their silent support when the girls training recommenced, just as they always had.

Eventually, they'd move on, purely out of necessity. Because the choice was either that or death. They'd move on, but they wouldn't forget.


End file.
